
Courtesy of the Pan American Union 

Palm Avenue, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 



LANDS AND PEOPLES SERIES 



SOUTH AMERICA 

A GEOGRAPHY READER 



By Isaiah Bowman, Assistant Professor of 
Geography in Yale University, with an intro- 
duction to the series by Richard Elwood 
Dodge, Professor of Geography, Teachers 
College, Columbia University 



RAND McNALLY & COMPANY 

Chicago New York 



Copyright, iyi5, 
By Isaiah Bowman 



\l 



-v^ 




/ 



5 



Chicago 



MAY 3 1915 

©CI.A398654 



THE PREFACE 

South America, even more than Africa, has for years 
been the Dark Continent to the average teacher. Its 
geographic literature is meager, and much of it is in Span- 
ish, Portuguese, and German. Where can the teacher go 
for a lively description of the long desert of Atacama? 
Until the English edition of Brazil by Pierre Denis was 
published (191 1), where could be found a real explanation 
of the geographic provinces of that country? To-day 
the best work on the Argentine is in French; and the best 
brief description of the high plateaus of Bolivia and Peru 
is in German. It is impossible for the busy teacher in 
the public schools to gather from the best books, even if 
lists of them were available, the material for good work 
on the geography of South America. 

The aim of this little book is to put into convenient 
form for elementary students some of the material I have 
gathered during the past ten years of study and travel. 
It is not a handbook. It does not pretend to coA^er all 
parts of the continent in the same detail. I have chosen 
those subjects that appear to me to be most interesting 
or most important in the present state of knowledge of 
South America. No one who writes a book worth reading 
applies a foot rule to his subject. I conceive that an 
excellent geography of any continent might be written for 
children which dealt only with houses or dress or villages 
or roads. No one carries, or indeed could carry, into his 
maturer years a well-proportioned knowledge of grammar- 
school subjects. That some knowledge should stick and 
that it should be sound and important— these are the 
chief considerations. So the question of presentation is, 

(v) 



vi THE PREFACE 

first, the determination of what is sound and valuable, and 
— what is of at least equal importance — how it can be 
presented so as to be interesting. 

Endless experiment is needed. The best results are 
not easy to achieve. Thus new books are appearing 
which are worth while if they present new facts or illus- 
trate better methods. Whether the method followed in 
the pages of this book is better than those now in vogue, 
only experience will tell. Many of the facts I have gath- 
ered first-hand in the course of various scientific expedi- 
tions to Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and the Argentine, and these 
will have at least some interest for the teacher, if not for 
the pupil. 

Most of the illustrations are from my own collections. 
Others have been gathered from various sources acknowl- 
edged in the text. I wish here to express my hearty 
thanks for the help received in this form. I am particu- 
larly indebted to Neville B. Craig for the excellent photo- 
graphs of the Madeira River region in the chapter on 

the Amazon. 

T ■, TT . . Isaiah Bowman 

Yale university 

December 10, 1914 



THE INTRODUCTION 

Many attempts have been made in the past to prepare 
supplementary geography readers that would enable 
teachers to increase the emphasis that can be given to 
the picturesque side of geography — that is, to add good, 
strong side lights to the necessarily brief and sometimes 
formal presentation of the more comprehensive text- 
books. Such reading-matter obviously ought to be as 
accurate, authoritative, and systematic as the material 
of a textbook, and must be presented in an appealing 
and readable form. Children of the age to get profit 
from such supplementary work are attracted by a volume 
that tells a story in an absorbing and enlightening way, 
just as they are by a story full of action. In either case, 
the book that causes the child to curl up in a corner and 
lose himself in his reading is the valuable book, provided 
its contents are sound, inspiring, and educative in the 
best sense. Children want to have faith in the realness 
and the value of what they read and to be able to relate 
the newly acquired material to the more familiar matter 
gained in formal study. 

The editor and publishers have attempted to meet 
these demands in the series of supplementary volumes, 
of which this is the second to appear. Each author who 
is contributing to this series is a geographer of high 
repute, an authority on the country described, whose 
accounts are accepted as standard by the scientific world. 
Each one writes from a fullness of knowledge of the 
facts depicted and with a keen appreciation of the way 
the people in each country reflect the influence of the 



viii THE INTRODUCTION 

geographic surroundings in their habits and customs. 
The editor has secured the services of the several authors, 
has planned the larger features of treatment, and has edited 
the manuscripts from a common viewpoint so as to secure 
a certain uniformity of plan of presentation, but he has 
in no way sacrificed the individuality of the authors' 
work. . 

Thus the series will be a collection of expert treatises, 
written for a special purpose and from a common view- 
point. It will not be a compilation of the work of others 
or a series of travelers' notes especially prepared to amuse. 
It will be a standard treatment of the world by regions, 
from the modern standpoint that geography is a study 
of the earth in its relation to man and life and that the 
most interesting topics in geography deal with the lives 
of peoples and the reasons for their habits, customs, 
industries, and distribution. 

Richard Elwood Dodge 

Teachers College 
Columbia University 
New York City 



THE CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The Preface . . . . . . ... . . v 

The Introduction vii 

A List of the Map Plates x 

CHAPTER 

I. People and the Land They Conquered i 

II. The Southernmost People in the World . 14 

III. Patagonia, the "No Man's Land" of the Old 

Geographies 21 

IV. The Argentine ........ 35 

V. The Valleys of Central Chile .... 73 

VI. The Coastal Desert of Chile and Peru . . 84 
VII. The Highland Dwellers of Bolivia and Peru . 128 

VIII. The Inca Kings and People 161 

IX. The Plains and Indians of El Gran Chaco . .176 

X. Paraguay n . . . . 185 

XL Uruguay: The Smallest Country in South 

America 192 

XII. Brazil: The Country of Many Interests . . 199 

.XIII. Amazonia: Land of Great Forests and Rivers . 237 

XIV. Ecuador: Land of Volcanoes . . . .270 

XV. Lowland and Highland Peoples of Colombia . 294 

XVI. The Mountains and Llanos of Venezuela . .314 

XVII. The Guianas: The Only European Colonies 

in South America 342 

The Index ' xiii 



4 



A LIST OF THE MAP PLATES 

PAGE 

Mean annual rainfall facing 8 

A political map of South America between 8 and 9 

Mild belts facing 9 , 

Southern South America facing 35 

Mean January temperature ' facing 124 

Mean July, temperature facing 125 

Mean January rainfall facing 202 

A relief map of South America between 202 and 203 

Mean July rainfall facing 203 

Density of population facing 316 

A vegetation map of South America between 316 and 317 

Races of man facing 317 




Quichua Indians and donkey loaded with wheat straw, Cuzco, Peru. 

Also portion of the famous palace formerly used 

by the Inca rulers 




SOUTH AMERICA: 
A GEOGRAPHY READER 

CHAPTER I 
PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED 

The "Conquistadores " or Conquerors. In one of the 

stories of The Arabian Nights Sindbad of the Sea landed 
at the "City of Apes," so called because the tall coconut 
trees along the shore and the caves in the mountains 
were inhabited by great numbers of these terrifying 
beasts. The houses of the city were built overlooking 
the water with doors that opened to the sea, and every 
evening for fear of the apes the people embarked in 
boats to return at daylight. If a man stayed behind 
for the night the apes came down from the trees and the 
mountains, entered his house, and killed him. During the 
day the apes threw coconuts at the people, and these 
were carefully gathered both for food and to exchange for 
merchandise brought in ships from other lands. 

Like all the other stories in The Arabian Nights, the 
story of the City of Apes was 'told merely to entertain 
people, though at the same time it taught them that 
there were such things in the world as apes, and coco- 
nuts, and trade. 

More than a hundred and fifty years ago a number 
of books on geography were written full of equally won- 
derful tales of strange lands and people, all supposed to 
be true. Indeed, these tales were read even by grown 
people with very much the same interest that children now 
read fairy stories. Each chapter ended with an account 



2 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

of the "rarities" or "curiosities" of some country, in which 
were told the wildest tales that travelers could invent. 
The people of Russia were said to wear clothes made 
from the woolly skin of a melon ; the Amazon Basin was 
inhabited by a race of women of great size whose heads 
were placed not above their shoulders but between 
them; and in other parts of South America there lived 
beasts having the body of a man, the head of a lion, and 
the face of an ape. One of the most incredible ' ' wonders ' ' 
in these books was that of El Dorado, a tale that was 
believed for several hundred years after the discovery 
of America, and on account of which men actually left their 
homes by thousands to fight under foreign skies 

There are many contradictory accounts of the beginning 
of the story of El Dorado. Perhaps the most reliable 
among these is one which relates that the story was first 
brought to the Spanish conquerors by an Indian in Ecua- 
dor. Knowing that love for gold was the ruling passion 
of the Spaniards, he told them that in the remote interior 
there was said to be a "Man of Gold." About the Indian 
who brought the tale the Spanish soldiers came crowding 
and questioning. "Was the place at a great distance?" 
"How could one get there?" "Would he show them the 
way?" No one thought to ask, "Is the tale true?" 
because those were the days of marvelous discoveries and 
bold adventures. Not only were men having amazing 
experiences — they were always expecting greater marvels 
than any that had come to pass and were eager to believe 
the wildest fancies. So when they heard of El Dorado 
their imaginations played with the story until they 
thought the Indian had told them that El Dorado was 
a great city filled with gold palaces, and that it was 
inhabited by men and women dressed in gold cloth, and, 
with gold spoons, eating food cooked in golden kettles. 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED 3 

Though the story was not true it was long believed, 
like similar stories about the fountain of youth and 
King Solomon's mines, and the belief drew thousands of 
adventurers into the wilderness in search of sudden 
wealth. The explorers and the conquerors of that period 
traveled up and down many rivers, crossed lofty moun- 
tains, and upon their return published maps and notes 
which for a long time furnished people with the only 
information they could get about the great interior of 
South America. Perhaps without the story of El Dorado 
and the search for it the first explorations of the vast 
interior of the Amazon Basin might have been delayed for 
a hundred years. In the footsteps of the explorers, and 
sometimes even in their company, went missionaries of 
the church, baptizing the natives, christening the children, 
and erecting missions where they might teach the Indians 
"for the glory of the cross." 

The True El Dorado. With the " conquistadores" 
and the missionaries, and in greater numbers after them, 
came farmers and herdsmen, whose object was not to 
search for gold or silver but to make homes in a new 
country. Some of them, sailing south from Panama, 
settled in the rich valleys of Peru, others settled in central 
Chile and on the shores of the La Plata estuary, and 
there were some for whom the unknown Andes offered 
no terrors and who founded trading posts and homes 
in the remotest mountain valleys and even in the forests 
of the great Amazon lowland. While the greater num- 
ber .of the newcomers were men, there were also a few 
women and children who faced dangers and hardships 
that appalled the strongest. These people were the 
real conquerors of South America. On the pampas of 
the Argentine, the plains and valleys of Venezuela, and 
in the mountain basins and valleys of Peru and Chile 



SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



they discovered an El Dorado far richer than any of 
which the early explorers had dreamed, for the soil is 




Pig. t . Fertile irrigated garden farms near Lima, Peru. 

Almost every foot of ground is used. The water is 

obtained from the Rimac River 

the enduring wealth of the land (Figs, i and 2). Little 
did they think that their descendants would live to see new 
nations arise, great herds feeding upon once empty grass- 
lands, and the crowded peoples of western Europe depend- 
ent for at least a part of their food supply upon the grain 
fields and pastures that their explorations had made 
known. 

The Wars of Emancipation. For several hundred 
years the settlers remained loyal to the monarchs of 
Spain, paying taxes and on the whole obeying the laws, 
whether these were good or bad. When so-called Spanish 
rule came to be recognized as misrule, and the laws and 
taxes of Spain became too irksome, the settlers began 
what are known as the "Wars of Emancipation." Each 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED .5 

group of settlers had its own particular grievance against 
Spain, and each was separated from its neighbors by 
miles of wild, unsettled country. The settlements about 
Caracas and the seaport La Guaira joined with those at 
Valencia, and, after a long, heroic campaign, defeated the 
armies of Spain and founded the republic of Venezuela. 
About the same time there was fighting in Peru and in 
Chile; and on the shores of the Rio de la Plata the 
settlers were planning the overthrow of Spain and the 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood 

Fig. 2. Picking cotton with Chinese labor on irrigated land 

in a fertile valley at the foot of the A ndes, 

Uitarte, Peru 



6 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

establishment of a confederation that has since grown to 
be the Argentine Republic. Gradually each group became 
independent, and republics were formed with governments 
modeled after that of the United States. 

The Character of the People. Although the white 
people of South America are for the most part descendants 
of Spaniards and Portuguese they are by no means alike 
in character. Some are children of the wide pampas or 
grasslands of the Argentine; others live a secluded life in 
the mountain fastnesses of the Andes; in the rubber 
forests of the wet Amazon lowlands are isolated settle- 
ments rarely visited by white men even to-day; while in 
the smiling valleys of central Chile, where the climate is 
temperate, there live the energetic Chileans. 

The differences between these various groups of people 
in many ways remind us strikingly of similar differences 
among plants and animals and suggest that people, like 
plants and animals, are to some extent what their surround- 
ings make them. On the wet Orinoco lowlands, when the 
river floods the country for miles the people have to live in 
the second stories of their houses, or in the trees like some 
species of frogs. The bronzed and weather-beaten faces of 
the desert people remind us of the cactus with its thorns 
and hard exterior; the tempests of the pampas and the 
fleet guanaco are scarcely more wild than the gauckos, 
a class of men in some respects like the picturesque cow- 
boys of our western plains. 

Just as we can tell a Scotchman from an Irishman or 
a Persian from an Armenian, so we can tell a Peruvian 
from a Chilean or a Colombian from a Brazilian. Not 
only are there differences of speech from place to place 
but also slightly different customs which appear to 
have grown out of the kind of place in which the people 
have settled as well as the province in Spain or Portugal 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED 7 

om which they came. With « the growth of separate 
republics and national spirit these differences have 
become greater. The native of Valparaiso no longer says 
with the man from Quito or Lima, "I am a Spaniard," 
but "I am a Chilean." Men who herd cattle are likely 
to be different from men who hoe gardens or gather rubber 
on great rivers. In some countries real statesmen have 
been developed, in others the government has been run 
by coarse politicians who have robbed the people; one 
country has enjoyed a stable government because the 
people are proud of their flag and teach their children 
loyalty to rulers; another country has on the average a 
new revolution every eighteen months! 

To one who has enjoyed the hospitality of a shepherd's 
hut in the mountains, or lived for weeks in the saddle 
riding through the grassy plains of the Argentine, or 
walked for days in and out of the houses of the coffee 
pickers in the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil, even the smaller 
differences among the people of South America appear 
as interesting as the larger differences that give each 
nation distinction. 

The Anglo-Saxon race to which we belong is known in 
the world for its force of character, its habit of speaking 
directly to the point, and, to some, for its lack of polite 
manners. The Latin peoples — among them the Italians 
and the Spaniards — think Anglo-Saxons are rather rude 
and are inclined to boast that even if Latin peoples are 
not so successful in making vast sums of money they are 
at least polite in making a little money. 

A man from Boston once visited a schoolroom in Spain 
and heard the teacher tell the children that Americans 
are very cruel. "Just think," she said, "American boys 
have been known to fight with their fists, like animals, 
until their noses became bloody." Upon his return the 



8 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

traveler happened to step into a schoolroom in Boston 
and there heard a teacher say: "The Spaniards are 
a cruel and bloodthirsty people. Every Sunday they 
gather around a great arena and watch bullfights at which 
bulls are cruelly killed, horses gored, and men trampled 
by infuriated beasts." The Spaniards are no more 
cruel than we, some of them are much more courteous, 
and many of them are also very energetic and successful. 
Perhaps it would be well if each race gained the best 
qualities of the other. It certainly would do no one 
harm to be as polite as a Spaniard. 

The stranger is everywhere made to feel at home by 
the charming phrase, "Please consider my house your 
own," whether the host lives in a hut or a palace. From 
those who live in the larger cities the phrase carries 
good will rather than a real invitation to move your 
baggage into the best room. From the owner of a rich 
hacienda (plantation) or from the humble shepherd it 
carries a literal meaning. A traveler once stopped at 
a Bolivian hut on the edge of the Amazon Basin. He 
had come from the cool highlands in a single day and 
was too tired to do more than eat some soup and fried 
yuca and to accept the owner's invitation to sleep in 
the dining room, an invitation which ended with the 
usual phrase — "because it is your house, you know." 
But the close air of the stuffy little room, the pest of 
flies and mosquitoes, and the cackling of the startled 
hens roosting over the table on which the traveler had 
spread his bed, made sleep impossible, so the next day 
he pitched his tent near the bank of a river some distance 
from the hut. At this the owner was very angry. It 
appeared to him as if his invitation had been scorned, 
and only after long explanation could he be made to see 
that the soft sand bar, covered with driftwood and well 




Plate I. Mean annual rainfall 




Febnao do 
(^SWbonba I. 

C. Sao'Roqua 

C. Branco 



Plate III. Mild bells 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED 9 

supplied with fresh water, was an ideal camp site for 
people accustomed to sleep in the open. To offer to pay 
a hacendado for a night's lodging is to break a friendship 
which on his part began when he invited you to rest 
yourself and your beasts under his roof. 

Harbors and Products. The countries of South Amer- 
ica for the most part enjoy easy access to the long coast 
and to the world's trade routes. A position in the 
remote interior would mean a degree of isolation that 
would prevent growth because products would have 
to be shipped down long winding rivers or across lofty 
mountains. Only Paraguay and Bolivia are without a 
seacoast, though Paraguay has a river channel which 
brings steamers to the gates of the country. Bolivia, 
on the other hand, depends upon railways across Chile 
and Peru, having lost all of her maritime territory to 
Chile during the war of 1879-1883. 

Like so many other conditions in South America, 
this is not well known to many of the people of other 
continents. Some years ago a European nation had 
trouble with Bolivia and one of the European statesmen 
is said to have remarked that if Bolivia did not come to 
terms it would be necessary to send a battleship over 
to South America and bombard La Paz, the capital of 
Bolivia. In order to bombard the city the guns of that 
battleship would have had to shoot about, four hundred 
miles ! Of course the statesman felt very much ashamed 
when he was told that La Paz was so far from the sea, 
and we may be sure that before he talked any more about 
Bolivia he opened an atlas and studied the geography of 
South America. 

Since nearly all the countries of South America border 
the sea, a trip around the continent gives the traveler 
some idea of the various people and their products. 



io SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Along the coast are the important harbors which serve 
as gateways to the great interior spaces. At Para is 
the rubber hunter; the man who gathers turtles' eggs 
for a living ; the German merchant who trades manufac- 
tured goods for crude rubber. At Bahia the warehouses 
contain cacao, tobacco, and sugar. At Santos the air is 
loaded with the odor of coffee, and ships from all the 
coffee-drinking countries of the world crowd the docks. 
The grain boats that come down the Parana from Rosario, 
as well as the steamers at the docks of Buenos Aires, tell 




Fig. 3. A railway line up the face of the steep three-lhousand- 
foot bluff at Caleta Buena, northern Chile. Nitrate 
of soda is the chief export 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED n 



us of the extensive farms and ranches and the wide 
spaces of the pampas of the Argentine, while the boats 
from the southern 
coast carry great 
cargoes of wool 
brought to Gal- 
/ legos and Porto 
Madryn by the 
lonely sheep herd- 
ers of the bleak 
gravel plains of 
Patagonia. 

Nowhere in 
South America is 
there a more pe- 
culiar coast than 
in northern Chile, 
where the steep 
cliffs rising sever- 
al thousand feet 




Fig. 4. 



The rough surface of a salt plain in 
the desert of northern Chile 



above the sea are bare from top to bottom and seem 
to lead up to a desert quite unfit for man (Fig. 3). 
But beyond those great cliffs is a pampa, or plain, which 
contains nitrate, a substance so valuable and so rare 
that ships from almost every country in the world lie 
in near-by ports to receive cargoes of it. This nitrate is 
to be used in fertilizers, gunpowder, and other chemicals 
in both Europe and North America (Fig. 4)- The 
cotton and sugar of Peru (Figs. 1 and 2) are carried to 
northern countries in large quantities, and in Ecuador 
there are produced every year thousands of pounds of 
cacao, from which some of our chocolate and cocoa is 
made (Fig. 5). 

When a man buys a rubber coat he is buying in part the 



12 



SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



labor of a savage who gathered sap from a rubber tree, 
smoked it over a fire of palm nuts, and carried it down- 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood 

Fig. 5. Gathering cacao pods from which the chocolate and 

cocoa of commerce are produced, La Clementine 

plantation, Ecuador 

stream in a dugout canoe; when we drink coffee we are 
drinking a product of the red soil and brilliant sunshine 
of Sao Paulo, Brazil; the shoes on our feet may have 
been made from the hide of an Argentine steer; the big 
guns of our battleships, as well as the firecrackers used 
in our celebrations, may be charged with powder contain- 
ing nitrate from Chile; and the chocolate for the frosting 



PEOPLE AND THE LAND THEY CONQUERED 13 

on our cake once grew as the seed of the cacao tree in 
cucumber-shaped pods and was gathered and dried by 
some swarthy, barefooted native in "the land of the 
Equator." 



CHAPTER II 
THE SOUTHERNMOST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD 

The Home of the Yaghan Indians. At the extreme 
end of the group of islands that fringe the southern 
end of South America live the Yaghan Indians, ,the 
remnants of a folk in many respects unique among the 
savage people of the earth. Some idea of the kind of 
place which they inhabit may be gained from the map 
(Plate IV) , which shows that the Yaghans live in latitude 
fifty-five degrees to fifty-six degrees south, or about as far 
south of the equator as Sitka, Alaska, is north. 

Like the Eskimo, the Yaghan is a child of nature. His 
life is a constant fight for food, of which there is little 
enough in a land so wet and cold. Like the "roaring 
forties," this is a region where the west winds sweep over 
land and sea. Steep mountains rise abruptly from the 
water's edge, and about their peaks storm clouds hover 
almost constantly. At least three hundred days of 
the year are cloudy. A dull sky, rain-swept mountain 
sides, the wind a gale, the sea beating the shores of the 
outer islands furiously, snow- and ice-crowned mountain 
tops, — these are almost constant elements of the scenery 
in this land of the southernmost people in the world. 

The great naturalist, Darwin, as a young man made a 
very important study of the region and wrote the first 
clear description of the people. The following quotation 
is from his well-known book, The Voyage of the Beagle. 

" The lofty mountains boldly rise to a height of between 
three and four thousand feet. They are covered by a 
wide mantle of perpetual snow, and numerous cascades 
pour their waters through the woods, into the narrow 

14 



THE SOUTHERNMOST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD 15 

channel below. In many parts, magnificent glaciers 
extend from the mountain side to the water's edge. It 
is scarcely possible to imagine anything more beautiful 
than the beryl-like blue of these glaciers, and especially 
as contrasted with the dead white of the upper expanse 
of snow. The fragments which had fallen from the glacier 
into the water were floating away, and the channel 
(Beagle Channel) with its icebergs presented, for the 
space of a mile, a miniature likeness of the Polar Sea." 

The Yaghans are among the most primitive people on 
the earth to-day. The leisure and wealth that many of . 
the people of the temperate zones possess is here unknown. 
The food supply in any particular place is small, hence 
the number of people found in any one place is small. 
From twenty to thirty men and women may live together 
as a clan, sharing in common the food supply and the 
danger of securing it. The entire energy of every man, 
woman, and child is spent in getting food, and this is 
usually of the poorest kind. If the members of a group 
are not actually engaged in gathering clams, seals, and 
fish — their principal diet — they are searching every cove 
for a favorable place in which food may be found. Often 
a single family of three or four — mother, father, and chil- 
dren—live apart from the rest in an isolation that appears 
to us both strange and fearful. The necessity for assist- 
ance in case of accident, of protection against an enemy, 
and the getting of food, is so great that life is more tolerable 
when a few families live together as a group and have 
a certain amount of assistance from each other in time 
of need. 

Sea Food and Canoe Fires. Instead of our comfortable 
houses they have only the roughest shelter of bark and 
twigs such as an animal might find at nightfall ; instead of 
having a fixed home they move frequently and abandon 



1 6 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

one place as soon as a better food supply can be found 
in another; although they live in a very bleak and cheer- 
less land their clothing is only a piece of sealskin which 
but partly covers the body and is shifted from one side 
to the other to correspond with the direction of the wind ! 

A regular food supply from meal to meal and from 
week to week is to them unknown. If a dead whale is 
washed ashore there is a feast; such also is the case if an 
exceptionally good bank of shells is found upon some 
little-visited beach. But it often happens that a storm 
■arises and lasts for days, confining the canoes to the 
land. Then if there is no food accumulated, and if 
the storm is severe enough, the group may be reduced 
to actual starvation. 

Travel by land is so difficult that it is rarely under- 
taken. Furthermore, these people are children of the sea 
rather than of the land. They are as much at home in a 
canoe as they are when walking on the shore. So little 
attached does it become to any particular home place, 
that when an Indian family goes out on a voyage it car- 
ries along its fire, kept burning upon some earth in the 
bottom of the canoe, thus assuring means for warmth 
and cooking when the next landing is made. 

The Onas of Tierra del Fuego. Upon Tierra del 
Fuego are the Onas, a primitive group of people who 
still lead a savage life such as their fathers led. Once their 
homes were scattered over the whole island, but since 
the coming of the European settlers, more than thirty 
years ago, they have been driven from the plains and 
are found only in the mountains of the south. The 
lowlands are now almost completely occupied by the 
sheep ranches of the white people. 

Before the whites came, the Onas depended chiefly 
upon the guanaco for food and clothing. Like its cousin 



THE SOUTHERNMOST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD 17 

the llama (Fig. 74), the guanaco appears to be half sheep, 
half camel, is very swift, and yields a warm, soft skin 
much used for clothing. But with increase in settlers 
the guanaco became very scarce. The Onas called the 
sheep of the settlers ''white guanaco," and found them 
easier to catch and their flesh tenderer and sweeter than 
that of the wild animals which had formerly been their 
main source of food. The guanaco became so scarce 
that the Onas, probably without thought of wrong, 
began to kill and eat the sheep that grazed on the land 
from which they had been driven. So many sheep were 
thus taken that the whites finally began a cruel war 
against the Onas, in some cases hiring men to kill them 
at sight. Some of them were captured and shipped to 
Dawson Island (latitude 54 S.), where tuberculosis has 
swept off most of those that were spared from the bullet. 
Even the blubber of the whale stranded upon the shores 
is said to have been poisoned so that those Indians who 
depended upon it for food would be killed. 

The Mountain Refuge of the Onas. Were Tierra del 
Fuego composed wholly of plain doubtless the Onas would 
have been entirely destroyed by this time. But the 
southern part is mountainous and stormy and covered 
in part with dense forests. It is not the kind of country 
desired by the sheep farmer or ranchman, and here the 
Onas have made their last stand. 

The lower mountain slopes of southern Tierra del Fuego 
are covered with evergreen beech trees and various 
shrubs. About two thousand feet above the sea the 
forests thin out and so bush-like do the trees become 
that one can step over them. In many places on the 
lower lands the growth is so rank that one cannot make 
headway except by cutting a path with an ax. From 
the twisted trunks hang long festoons of mosses and 



1 8 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



lichens and the sweet fungus which resembles mucilage 
and is eaten by the Indians. Soft mosses, carpeting 




Fig. 6. Part of the town of Punta Arenas, Strait of Magellan 

the ground, hold the water at the surface and turn part 
of it into impassable bog. 

"Among the mosses, and along the wood edges, delicate 
ferns, yellow violets, orchids, cranberries, compositas, 
and other plants are found. But perhaps one of the most 
beautiful shrubs in the world is a naming red honeysuckle- 
like plant. ... As one cruises about the channels its 
flowers paint on the hillsides broad patches of beauti- 
ful red against its darker background of sombre green. 
The flowers here have practically no odor, but on bright 
sunny days, which sometimes do occur in this weird, 
sombre land, make the wood edges and grass lands quite 
gay in midsummer (December 2 1 st) . " (Furlong.) 

The Southernmost City in the World. On the north- 
ern shore of the Strait of Magellan is Punta Arenas, a 
city of fifteen thousand people, which has the distinction 
of being the southernmost town in the world (Fig. 6). 
Unlike Africa and Australia, South America extends well 



THE SOUTHERNMOST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD 19 

toward the Antarctic Circle. Cape Town in South Africa 
is only as far south of the equator as New Orleans is north ; 
but Punta Arenas is as far south of the equator as Sitka, 
Alaska, is north- of it. A map of the ocean trade routes 
of South America shows how important is the position 
of this unique town (Plate II). It is on the only water 
route through the southern Andes. Boats from Europe, 
Africa, or the east coast of North America desiring to 
make the west coast of South America have a choice of 
two routes : either the exposed and stormy route around 
Cape Horn, where one vessel in ten is lost or disabled, 
or the quieter and shorter route through the Strait of 
Magellan past Punta Arenas. 

The strait is so narrow, however (in one place it is 
only a mile between the lofty shores) , that sailing vessels 
find it very difficult to pass except with the most favorable 
wind and sea. Punta Arenas is therefore a great repair 
and coaling station for steamships on the southern 
routes, as Stanley on the Falkland Islands (Plate IV), 
several hundred miles east of the strait, is the great 
repair and supply station for sailing vessels. Fleets of 
steamers anchor in the port of Punta Arenas. Some of 
(hem receive coal for the long voyages between Europe 
and the west coast of South America. In addition, 
some of them receive the products of the country — the 
sheep, hides, tallow, and wool of the region north of 
the port. 

Punta Arenas itself is a revelation to one expecting 
to see frontier conditions. It has electric lights, a few 
well-paved streets, a newspaper, and good telephone and 
cable service. The name of the town is the Spanish for 
sandy point (Punta = point; Arena = sand). 

The prosperity of Punta Arenas depends largely upon 
the pastures north of the strait. East of the Andes 



20 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Mountains and extending northward for five hundred 
miles is a narrow belt of rich grazing country, whose 
southern end is now occupied by thousands of cattle, 
horses, and sheep. The products of the flocks and 
herds that graze on the plains bordering the strait are 
carried in huge wagons to Punta Arenas, whence they 
are shipped to the mills and factories of Europe and 
America, whither the steamers of the port are bound. 

The life of the herders in the sheep and cattle pastures 
of this region is that of the ranch and camp. It is the 
kind of life so well known in the United States from the 
early ranching people of Wyoming and western Texas — 
a careless, free, out-of-door life with much privation from 
winter storms, snows, and cold, with plain fare, rough 
speech, a cheerful hospitality, and a certain frankness not 
always found in the manners of people who dwell in cities. 

Many of the shepherds not only care for their flocks 
but also cultivate a few vegetables, and live in perma- 
nent homes. These men are for the most part English 
and Scotch. They have found here a country as well 
suited to grazing as their own, and where it is easier to 
make a living than in the crowded homeland. 



CHAPTER III 

PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND" OF THE 
OLD GEOGRAPHIES 

"No Man's Land." Patagonia has long been known as 
one of the remote regions of the world, and until a few 
score years ago it was practically an unknown land. On 
the maps of the older geographies it was named "No 
Man's Land," for it was the property of neither Chile 
nor the Argentine and at that time neither cared much 
for it. It was a land of barren plains and heavy storms, 
without any white settlers. Of late years the region has 
become better known through explorations made by 
scientific men and the gradual occupation of the coast 
by Europeans who have come to the Argentine to engage 
in the grazing industry. There are still great areas in 
which one may travel for weeks without meeting a human 
being, not even an Indian, though even in the remote 
places men have made explorations and have given us 
very good descriptions of the extent of the land, the na- 
ture of its resources, and the character of its scenery. 

The Meaning of the Word "Patagonia." When the 
Spaniards first visited the mainland of Patagonia they 
saw on the beach sands the huge footprints of Indians. 
The discovery was made at a time when men were not 
only finding new wonders every day, but were ready to 
invent and believe the strangest tales; and, since they had 
never before seen human footprints so large as these, 
they at once thought that they were in a land of giants. 
So they called the land "Patagonia," which means "big 
feet ' ' (patacon = big feet) . The people whose footprints had 
excited the wonder of the Spaniards were the Tehuelches, 
a tribe of kindly Indians who live on the wide, cold 



22 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

plains of southern Patagonia. While they are not 
really giants, as the early explorers described them, they 
are, nevertheless, unusually large (Fig. 7). The average 
height of the men is about five feet eleven inches, and 
their average weight about one hundred and seventy- 
five pounds. The average height of the women is five 
feet seven inches; their weight is about the same as that 
of the men. By comparison it may be interesting to 
note that the average height of the white man is five 
feet eight inches, and of the white woman, five feet 
four inches. 

The Tehuelche Indians. Although the Tehuelches are 
an uncivilized tribe they are very friendly to the stranger 
who travels among them. Their faces are frank, their 
tents of skin and their food are at the traveler's disposal, 
and their kindly manner and gentle disposition at once 
put the stranger at his ease. Many of the whites who have 
visited them have not, however, treated them fairly. 
White men's diseases have gained a foothold among these 
children of nature, and from a large tribe of perhaps 
five thousand they have been reduced to about five hun- 
dred. Their strong muscular bodies are able to with- 
stand the cold wind and the snow of their bleak land, but 
the new diseases, especially tuberculosis, produce terrible 
effects among them. It will be only a matter of a few 
years until the Tehuelche Indians, one of the best tribes 
in America, will cease to exist. 

Hunting the Ostrich and the Guanaco. The Tehuelche 
Indians are a hunting tribe and depend for their food 
supply almost entirely on two animals of the Patagonian 
plains, the rhea, or South American ostrich, and the 
guanaco. These they hunt, not with firearms, as white 
men do, but with bolas, made of two or three small 
round stones, or large heavy balls covered with skin 




Fig. 7. Tehuelche woman 
23 



24 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

and fastened together by strings of braided or twisted 
rawhide. Holding one of the stones in his right hand, 
the Tehuelche hunter rides after the game at a gallop 
until he is within striking distance. The bola is thrown 
in such a way that the whirling balls carry the strings 
round and round the legs, neck, or body of the animal, 
entangling and tripping it, whereupon the hunter dis- 
mounts and kills it. The rhea has such small wings 
that it is unable to fly and must therefore depend upon 
its legs for escape. Even flying birds may be caught if 
the hunter is able to steal upon a flock close enough to 
throw the bola among them as they rise, and entangle 
their legs or wings. 

The Tehuelche hunter did not always depend upon the 
bola. Before the coming of the Spaniard he hunted 
chiefly with bow and arrow and was obliged to steal 
close to the game to bring it down. As soon as the 
horse was introduced the bow and arrow practically dis- 
appeared. The horse also helped the Tehuelches in war 
against the Pampa Indians, who lived on the plains north 
of the Rio Negro. When they depended upon their legs 
for safety their camps had to be made in the bottoms 
of deep canons or hidden away among the rocks on the 
side of a valley, where their fierce northern neighbors 
could not find them. As soon as they learned the use of 
the horse they were able to camp almost where they chose, 
for if an enemy came they could take to flight and have 
a fair chance of escape. To-day one may find the old 
camping grounds of the Tehuelches in many places along 
the stream valleys. The ground is covered with broken 
pottery, and pieces of the bones of the guanaco, rhea, fishes, 
and birds, besides arrowheads in great numbers. 

The Harvest Time of the Tehuelches. The busiest 
time of year for the Tehuelche Indians is the guanaco 



PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND 



25 



chico or "little guanaco" season. Then he gathers for 
clothing not the skin of the ordinary guanaco, killed for 




Fig. 8. Tehuelche squaw painting a guanaco skin 

its meat, but the skin of the very young. The little 
guanaco season extends from November 1 5 to February 1 . 
After a camp site has been selected in some region where 
the guanaco come in great numbers to feed and drink, 
the men begin to hunt the young and none is killed that 
is older than two months. The very best bedding and 
clothing is made from the skins of guanaco that have just 
been born. The men do the killing and skinning while the 
women dry and cure the skins and make them into gar- 
ments. The different skins are sewed together so nicely 
that it is difficult to tell where one begins and the other 
ends. Sometimes very pretty effects are made by com- 
bining certain natural colors in the skins of the animals. 
Frequently the completed garment is decorated with 
paint to give it a more striking appearance (Fig. 8). 

In September and October the Tehuelches gather the 
eggs of the rhea. These are laid in holes scooped out of 



26 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the ground, perhaps forty or fifty in a single spot — due 
to the peculiar habits of the females, several of which 
use the same nest. 

A Tehuelche Home. The home of the American boy or 
girl is made of wood or brick or stone, or more rarely of sod 




Fig. 9. A typical "toldo" or tent, home of a Tehuelche family 

or adobe, but the home of the Tehuelche child is made 
of the skin of the guanaco. The Patagonian plains have 
almost no timber, and in place of it the Indians must 
use the skins of animals. The Tehuelche tent, or toldo 
as it is called in Patagonia, is made of a number of skins 
sewed together and fitted over a framework of poles 
(Fig. 9). Because of the prevailing westerly winds, the 
front of the tent is always placed so as to face the east. 
Stakes are then placed at the opening and to them is 
attached an apron about four feet in height so that 
when the wind blows from the east, as it does once in a 
while, it may not blow into the tents. Sleeping places 
are arranged in the rear, each place being made large 



PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND" 27 

enough for two people. Adjacent bunks are separated 
from each other by a skin partition. Rugs are spread 
on the ground, and these are covered with bedding which 
consists of the soft skins of the very young guanaco. 

The toldo serves the Tehuelche much better than a 
wooden house because, if he wishes to move to a new 
hunting ground or flee from an enemy, he can with little 
trouble pack up the skins, carry them to a new site, and 
quickly set them up again. In this rude home the Te- 
huelche has a certain amount of comfort and altogether 
he is fairly well off, for he is physically well made, has 
abundant game, and is relatively free from trouble with 
his neighbors. 

The Surface of Patagonia. Patagonia extends from 
the Rio Negro (Plate IV) southward about one thousand 
miles to the Strait of Magellan; and from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific it is from two hundred to four hundred 
miles wide. The part that lies in Chile is made up 
chiefly of mountains whose lower slopes are covered 
with forests, and whose rocky and treeless upper slopes 
are partly covered with snow and ice. Among these 
mountains are a number of fertile valleys, and toward 
the north and east some of these are occupied by settlers, 
but by far the greater number of the people in the region 
live in Argentine Patagonia, where treeless, grassy plains 
and a less severe climate make grazing possible. Pata- 
gonia is so vast that one cannot describe the country as 
a whole in a general way but must divide it into natural 
regions, each of which has rather uniform topography 
and climate. Along the eastern coast there is a narrow 
strip of land about twenty to fifty miles in width marked 
by wave-cut terraces of great size. In the general uplift 
of the land there were intervals when the land remained 
at a given level long enough for the waves to plane 



28 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

off a coastal platform. The process, repeated several 
times, at length gave rise to a series of platforms each 
with a flat top and a rather abrupt face. Uplift later 
on made terraces out of the platforms. 

The Herdsmen of the Coast. In the best places 
along the coast one finds settlements such as Gallegos 
(Fig. i o), Port Desire, Port San Julian, and Santa Cruz, 
The people who live in these out-of-the-way places are 
Scotchmen, Englishmen, Welshmen, and a few Germans 
and Italians. They have come from, their crowded home 




Fig. io. Rio Gallegos, Patagonia, at low tide 

countries to a new continent where land is free, and 
although they are in a remote corner of the world and 
live in rough homes, they at least have plenty to eat 
and to wear. Nor is the new home entirely different 
from the old one, for the people who come to Patagonia 
are for the most part herdsmen. To the Scotsman espe- 
cially the new home is quite like the old, with its frequent 
storms, its dull, leaden skies, its low temperature, and 
its extensive sheep pastures. ' 

The Shingle Plain of Patagonia. West of the coastal 
strip of land where most of the herders live, one finds an 
upland region of little value to man. The rainfall, 
insufficient for the best growth of grass, sinks rapidly 



PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND" 29 

into the earth and in places leaves the surface dry and 
barren. In the southern part of Patagonia is a region 
covered with coarse gravel and small stones that go by 
the name of shingle. This material was laid down by 
icebergs when the land stood lower than now and while 
local ice sheets covered the mountains to the west. As 
the icebergs drifted seaward over what is now the shingle 
plain, they were gradually melted and their load of sand 
and gravel was dropped to the sea floor, — the surface 
that was later to' become the land of to-day. The 
process was not unlike that off Newfoundland and still 
farther south where icebergs from Greenland finally 
melt and drop their load of waste on the continental 
shelf which they have helped to make. A part of the 
material was washed into place by streams that descended 
from the mountains after the land rose above the sea. 

Besides the shingle plain there is in the Argentine 
provinces of Santa Cruz and Chubut a great tract of 
barren plateau country. Molten rock from the earth's 
interior was here forced out through fissures in the earth's 
crust to form a thick surface layer of rock known as 
basalt. So recently was this plateau formed that the 
rock has not yet decayed to form soil; hence grasses and 
shrubs are almost wholly lacking. The rivers that flow 
through the basalt plateau have cut deep canons that are 
very difficult to cross. The guanaco and the vizcacha, 
a kind of prairie dog, live along the canon floors, where 
a little vegetation may be found. At irregular intervals 
Indian bands wander through the region, but it is too 
wild to attract settlers in large numbers. 

The Belt of Pastures at the Foot of the Andes. Along 
the eastern foot of the Patagonian Andes is a narrow 
belt of gravels and sands largely the deposits of former 
glaciers and the rivers that they fed. The loose material 



30 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

is drained by clear mountain streams, and upon the valley 
floors there is rich pasture. North of Punta Arenas, as 
well as near Lake Nahuel Huapi, the pastures are used 
to a growing extent (Fig. n), but in the long stretch 
between, most of the land is idle because it is too remote 
from the sea and the railway. Wool and hides cannot 
be profitably carried over the great distances to the ports. 
Until railways afford an outlet to the eastern coast of 
Patagonia men will not be tempted to make their homes 
there, since they would be outside the currents of trade 
and obliged to live a rough life, depending entirely upon 
the country for everything they would need to eat and 
wear. When railways are finally built the region will 
develop, but until then it will be one of the idle lands 
of the earth. 

The most common inhabitant of the region to-day is 
the tucotuco, a little animal that burrows in the ground 
like a mole and eats the tender roots of the grasses. 
Many kinds of birds are found on the great lakes that 
lie along the mountain front, and the fleet guanaco roams 
the grassy valleys, almost undisturbed by man. 

The Lonely Settlements of Western Patagonia. About 
the headwaters of the Chubut and the Negro rivers in 
northern Patagonia is a line of settlements of special 
interest. They have been formed of Chilean and Argen- 
tine pioneers who have discovered in these good pas- 
tures an easy means of livelihood. The cattle are 
driven into Chile and also to the ends of railways that 
extend into northern Patagonia. For example, cattle 
from Lelejo, far south of Nahuel Huapi, are driven to 
Neuquen, whence they go by rail to the coast. Although 
the distance into Chile is shorter it involves crossing the 
Andes Mountains by way of passes covered with snow a 
part of the year. Difficult as these conditions appear, 



PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND" 31 

the venture has proved profitable enough to continue to 
attract an increasing number of new settlers. It is a 











1 

i 

1 


«k -»i 




4| K3rf' ; •'-^ ? * ""• 


■■^"fi.'i 






W' - 


sssf 


Bfo'*"! 1 - • — - 










i 









Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 1 1 . Lake Nahuel Huapi, A rgentine Republic. This is the 
westernmost extremity of the lake. Here the real pass across 
the Cordillera begins and the boundary between the two re- 
publics is only eight miles distant 

novel sight in the headwater portions of these valleys to 
come suddenly upon isolated settlements where tufted 
grasses support flourishing herds. One settler near 
Los Repollos, at the head of the Nuevo valley, raises 
horses and sheep as well as cattle and sells his cattle to 
traders who come into the valley from Chile. Lonely 
puestos, or shepherds' huts, may be seen in the most 
remote corners and are a sign that the land has been well 
spied out by the herders, those pioneers of settlements. 

The Welsh Settlers and the Valley of the 16th of 
October. The most interesting settlement among these 
remote people is the group of two or three hundred that 
lives in the Valley of the 16th of October (Plate IV). It 
should be explained first that streets, towns, and even 



32 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

river valleys in Spanish America are sometimes named after 
important historical dates, and that this curious name 
has been applied to the valley because it marks the day 
the settlers reached it. Here in a lovely valley of great 
fertility is a colony of settlers from Wales. All about 
are grassy hills which slope gently to the green flats of 
the valley floor. Cattle and sheep are produced, but the 
great distance from market is a serious drawback to the 
further development of grazing. For a time cattle had 
to be driven some five hundred miles north of Lake 
Nahuel Huapi before they found a convenient pass across 
the Andes to the Chilean towns. Direct connection with 
the outside world is by way of the Chubut valley to the 
Atlantic, where lives the larger parent colony of Welsh set- 
tlers from which those in the Valley of the 1 6 th of October 
came; and in later years communication has been estab- 
lished across the mountains south of Nahuel Huapi from 
Junin de los Andes and San Martin de los Andes into 
Chile (Plate TV). 

The way in which these Welsh folk of the Chubut 
valley came to South America is full of geographic interest. 
About i860 some of the mechanics and small farmers of 
Wales became discontented and restless under the rule of 
England and desired a home in some other land where 
they could preserve all their old national customs and' 
language, worship according to their own notions, and 
be entirely free from taxation. This idea of absolute 
freedom was born of the liberty the Welsh had enjoyed 
for centuries in the forests and rough mountains of Wales 
before their conquest by the English. Their mountain 
home had bred in them a strong love of independence and, 
in looking about for a new home where they could be as 
free as they once had been in the old days, they selected 
"No Man's Land," or Patagonia, where the Argentine 



PATAGONIA, THE "NO MAN'S LAND" 33 

government in 1862 granted to each family about one 
square mile of land. 

But when the first settlers arrived they were greatly 
disappointed, for the country appeared wild and barren, 
the climate was more severe than that of Wales, there 
were no trees, and the soil gave little promise of good crops. 
In other places in the Argentine there was better land, 
but the settlers had no money to buy it, and they would 
rather live in a wilderness than in a land of plenty and have 
troublesome neighbors. So they crowded into the narrow 
Chubut valley, built irrigation canals, and after terrible 
hardships, of which the world still knows but little, suc- 
ceeded in raising enough wheat for home needs and even 
for export. Chubut wheat was once famous throughout 
the Argentine, but the acreage is too small to make the 
product important. The chief products of to-day are 
wool and alfalfa. 

In 1 88 1, or about the time that the Welsh settlers 
began to feel established, "No Man's Land" came into 
the definite possession of the Argentine and was no longer 
a neglected territory. Up to that time the Welsh had 
been relatively free from taxation and had managed their 
own affairs. Since then Argentine officials have interfered 
with the once quiet life of the settlers. Military service 
in the National Guard is required, Spanish must be 
taught in the schools, and taxes regularly paid. The 
religious Welsh find military service especially distasteful 
since the regimental parades are held on Sunday. 

Finally, as the people steadily increased in numbers, 
the valley became overcrowded. Instead of farms a few 
thousand acres in extent, each family had only a few 
hundred acres. The Chubut valley became like a hive 
overstocked with bees. It seemed better for a part of 
the colony to move out and give the others more room, so 



34 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

in 1895 a small group moved westward and settled in 
the "Valley of the 16th of October." 

Added to these sources of discontent were the floods 
which visited the valley in 1899 and again in 1902. At 
first the great difficulty had been the want of water, not 
the abundance of it, and when floods came the poor 
irrigation works were broken down and the valley was 
covered with water. 

Other Welsh settlements have been made near the 
coast, as at Porto Madryn, Rawson, and Trelew, and with 
the growth in railways and irrigation works the colonists 
will become more attached to their new home (Plate IV) . 

Railways in Patagonia. The Argentine government is 
now building railways into the more valuable portions of 
Patagonia, and when these are completed the settlers who 
have already built homes in the region will be much 
better off and new settlements will probably be made in 
large numbers. The railway from the mouth of the 
Negro valley has been extended westward almost to 
the mountains, about three hundred miles, and it will 
soon reach the Lake Nahuel Huapi district, rich in 
resources of soil, water, and climate. Thence the line 
will extend into Chile by way of the Cajon Negro Pass 
and branch lines will be built northward to San Martin 
and Junin de los Andes and southward along the base 
of the mountains to the flourishing colony of Welsh 
settlers in the Valley of the 16th of October. These 
important lines will supply an outlet for rich pastures 
and still richer farms where the grains and fruits of the 
temperate zone will be produced in large quantities. 
Moreover, shorter railways will soon be built from various 
other points on the east coast westward into the better 
portions of the country, where settlers may find permanent 
homes. 



Concepcior 



SOUTHERN 
SOUTH AMERICA 

Scale 




Plate IV. 



Cape Horn Copyright 1914, by Rand MeNally & Co. 

Southern South America 



CHAPTER IV 
THE ARGENTINE 

A Big Country with Few People. Next to Brazil, the 
Argentine is the largest country of South America and 
has the largest number of people. But even this rank 
means less than one might suppose. There are only a 
little over seven million people in the Argentine, or less 
than twice as many as live in New York City alone. 
The population of New England is twice as large as 
that of the Argentine, and that of Belgium is almost the 
same. Yet the Argentine is more than half as large 
as the United States and nearly half as large as Europe. 
In thinking about the Argentine it will be worth while to 
remember that a country may have a great deal of land 
and yet contain very few people. When the United 
States gained its independence there were about three 
million people in it, or about as many as live in Bolivia 
to-day and about half as many as now live in New 
York City. We had a great deal of land at that time, 
but much of it was uninhabited. The Argentine is in that 
condition to-day; if its more than a million square miles 
of territory were divided equally among all the people 
each person would have a farm of about one hundred 
acres. In the United States each inhabitant would have 
about twenty-one acres, and in France and in England 
about one acre. 

We must not forget, however, that a country may be 
small in population and yet have the resources for becom- 
ing larger in the near future. Though the Argentine has 
but seven and a half million people there is good land 
that will support millions more. 

35 



36 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Large Spaces for Grazing. Vast tracts of Argentine 
territory are covered with grass and are therefore used 




Courtesy of Rudolph Schcvill 

Fig. 12. Corral at Guayamini, Argentine 

for the raising of cattle, sheep, horses, and mules. Even 
if all the water that now runs to waste in the rivers that 
cross the drier plains of the Argentine were turned out 
upon the land, large areas probably would still be left 
without a water supply capable of supporting crops. 
Upon such areas we shall always find the life of the ranch, 
as on our western plains; their people will always be 
herders and cowboys; their products will always be sheep, 
cattle, horses, and mules (Fig. 12). 

The number of people that can live on a square mile 
of even good grazing land is very small. Here are no 
large crowded cities like those we find in agricultural or 
manufacturing regions. The population is spread out 



THE ARGENTINE 37 

over a large area; houses are few and far between; the 
towns are little more than clusters of houses grouped 
about a railroad station; wide expanses of land stretch 
out in all directions with but the thinnest sprinkling of 
human beings. 

The Vast Pampas. By far the most important region 
of the Argentine is that known as the pampas, the flat 
plains that occupy the greater part of the country. The 
name "pampa" is of Indian origin and was in use when 
the Spaniards first came to the Argentine. It is given 
to any open level tract whether it is grass-covered or 
desert, in a high situation or near sea level. In the 
Argentine, however, the name is applied to the plains 
that occupy the central portion of the country. More 
precisely, the region of the pampas stretches from the 
Salado River on the north to the Negro on the south and 
from near the base of the Andes Mountains on the west 
to the Parana and Paraguay rivers on the east. So great 
a tract has many small differences in relief, rainfall, vege- 
tation, and products, but there are also some general 
features common to the whole region. 

Quite the first thing that strikes the traveler through 
the pampas is their exceeding flatness (Fig. 13). For 
long distances the eye can~~3istmguish no differences of 
level; the surface appears to be like the world of the 
ancients, — a vast plain stretching out to the great world 
river that encircled the earth. As a matter of fact the 
pampas are not quite flat. They consist in large part of 
shallow basins with floors partly covered with salt or 
sand or lakes of variable depth and extent. For the 
most part the water of the tributary streams is lost in 
the sand or evaporated from the surfaces of lakes. 
Counting large and small, the basins number many 
hundreds and have important effects on the drainage 



38 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




and the life of the pampas though they are too shallow 
to be a prominent or indeed in places even a visible 

feature of the relief. 
The pampas also slope 
toward the east, a 
feature due to the way 
in which they were 
formed. They are 
built of alluvial mat- 
ter, — sand, gravel, 
and silt carried down 
from the Andes by 
the eastward flowing 
streams. In small part 
courtesy of Rudolph Schevin a i so they are com- 
FiG. 13. Plowing on the Argentine pam- At 'A 

pas. Cochico ranch, near Guayamini, posed 01 marine Cte- 
Argentine. The tufted grass is called posits formed on the 
"pampa grass" and on it feed the , ■, £ ,, . 

great herds of cattle and the Ded ot tne ocean wnen 

wild guanaco part of what is now 

land was under the sea. The vast expanses of the pam- 
pas are interrupted by a few small mountain ranges. 
They but serve to emphasize the flatness of the plains 
around them and are important as the source of streams 
used for irrigation. 

The monotony of the outlook over the central plains 
is one of the qualities of Argentine scenery never for- 
gotten. A vast expanse of plain stretching away to a 
flat horizon is the most common sight during a journey 
across them. Little clumps of eucalyptus trees here 
and there dot the plain, small clumps grow about the 
huts of the shepherds, and border the avenues near the 
houses of the estancieros or ranchmen. The head- 
quarters of an estate is marked by a windmill, an almost 
universal sign of the pampas. Sometimes the monotony 



THE ARGENTINE 39 

of the view is broken by the brown of a freshly plowed 
field, or the tasseled green of corn, or a lagoon or swamp 
bordered by a belt of salt-covered plain and dotted with 
water fowl that make their home in great numbers on 
its reedy shores. Once in a while a South American 
ostrich, or rhea, may be seen stalking along or feeding 
with a flock of sheep. These and countless herds of cat- 
tle are the chief living features of the extensive pampas 
of the Argentine. 

A Country where Everybody Rides Horseback. It has 
been said that the people of the Argentine rest on two 
feet and travel on four. The remark helps us to under- 
stand how very common is horseback riding in this 
country of flat plains where even the distances from house 
to house are too great to traverse on foot. Everybody 
rides, and even very young boys learn to ride the swiftest 
horses. The managers of the large ranches visit and 
their men round up their herds and flocks on horseback 
(Fig. 14); children ride when they visit their playmates 
at a neighboring ranch house; and the hunter must 
ride because the game animals of the flat plains can see 
for long distances and are very fleet. 

Mirage and Cloud Scenery of the Pampas. Like the 
prairies and the western plains of our own country the 
pampas of the Argentine are a constant source of interest 
to the traveler who sees them for the first time. Their 
vast expanses are sublime; in the wind and the darkness 
they awaken in the lonely traveler a feeling of terror; 
the limitless wilderness of grass and flowers, with its 
scattered people and its unbroken expanses, is a marvel 
of plains scenery, with extraordinary changes in color 
from morning to night. Upon the hot pampas at midday 
the mirage sometimes produces magical effects. "A 
patch of plain becomes a lake, a distant thistle field a 



40 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



forest of tall timber, a dreary marsh a troop of phantom 
horsemen." (Keane.) 

The cloud effects are the most marvelous of all the 
pampa sights. When a thunderstorm comes up, the 
great bulky clouds are not hidden or half-hidden by 
surrounding hills as in a rough country; the whole cloud 
mass is clearly visible moving over the pampa miles 
away; all the awe of the thunder and the lightning is 
clear to the senses. Of more delicate beauty are the 
cloud effects in fair weather. Huge masses of cumulus 
clouds float majestically through the air, their fleecy 
white thrown in sharp contrast against the deep blue 
of the sky. At sunset the pampas are transformed no 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 14. Argentine cowboy 



THE ARGENTINE 41 

less wonderfully than at sunrise. In the softening light, 
clouds and waving grasses are brought out more distinctly 
and the west is tinged with delicate tints or bathed in 
the most extravagant colors. 

The Grasses of the Pampas. The vast central region 
of the pampas is peculiar in having a grass cover of nearly 
uniform quality and of few species. A common sort is 
that known as pampa grass, which is found in the wetter 
places, as about the shores of fresh-water lakes or along 
the valley floors where water is abundant. In the drier 
portions of the pampas both coarse and fine grasses grow 
in tussocks separated by a few feet or inches of bare 
ground or by inferior varieties of grasses and flowers and 
a few slender herbs and low shrubs. The soft grasses are 
excellent for sheep ; the coarse grasses are the food of the 
great herds of cattle for which the oampas are noted 

(Fig. 13). 

The Strong Pampa Winds. For several hundreds of 
miles there are no important interruptions to the move- 
ments of the air and, once the wind begins, it blows with 
almost the same freedom as at sea. The south winds, 
or the so-called antarctic gales, are particularly violent. 
And from the north comes the zonda, blowing with 
great strength at intervals during the winter months (July 
and August). Perhaps the most violent winds of all 
are the dreaded and boisterous pamperos, which blow 
from the southwest. For days the temperature will rise 
with the continuance of the north wind until the air 
becomes almost suffocatingly hot. Suddenly the wind 
changes, the southwest pampero begins to blow, thunder 
and lightning, a gloomy sky, and abundant rain accom- 
pany it, and in almost an instant the hot air is swept 
away before a bracing gale that leaves one shivering where 
before there was almost tropic heat. If long continued, 



42 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the pamperos do great damage to the cultivated fields 
of corn. Along the seacoast in the vicinity of Buenos 
Aires the winds from the sea blow during the southern 
summer with great strength, often becoming gales that 
strew the coast with wreckage and blow back the waters 
of the Rio de la Plata to such an extent as to flood the 
country far inland. 

Where Farmers Take Chances with the Rain. Of 
most serious consequences to man are the droughts for 
which the dry western plains are well known. They 
sometimes burn up the grasses and wither the shrubs, 
dry up the lakes and streams, and turn what was before 
a profitable range into a land that is half desert. 

We shall be able to understand these droughts by 
first noting the way in which the pampa rainfall is 
distributed. Plate I shows a gradual increase in the 
rainfall from west to east, with a maximum in the eastern- 
most provinces of the republic. In the west it is too 
dry for agriculture without irrigation and man does not 
depend directly upon rain for the growing of grains and 
vegetables. The farther east one goes the better become 
one's chances of raising crops without irrigation, and 
in the province of Buenos Aires farming on a large scale 
is carried on without the artificial use of water. The 
rainfall is reliable, large crops are produced every year, 
and the farmers are prosperous (Fig. 15). But every few 
years the edge of the dry belt moves farther east than 
usual and brings losses to the farmers of that region. 

In these respects then the dry border of the pampas 
of the Argentine reminds us of the plains of western Kan- 
sas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, where droughts sometimes 
ruin the crops and spread discontent among the farmers. 
These are the risky places of the earth, where man must 
take chances with the rain. 



THE ARGENTINE 



43 




The Prairie Dog of the Pampas. Late one afternoon a 
number of horsemen were riding across a sa&d^. pampa 
toward their camp 
beside a spring. 
One was a stran- 
ger, who rode a 
strong beast that 
galloped far ahead 
of the rest. Sud- 
denly his horse 
stumbled and fell 
over and over, 
throwing the rider 
at least twenty 
feet. When he 
hurried back to his 
beast he found 
both its forelegs 
broken, and to 
end its sufferings he was obliged to shoot it. Then, 
lame from his fall, the stranger walked into camp, 
where he arrived long after dark. He would have 
been lost had not the others built a great brush fire 
as a signal. 

The cause of all this trouble was a small hole made by 
a pampa animal called the vizcacha, which is in some 
respects like our prairie dog. He lives in dark chambers in 
the loose soil and is on friendly terms with the burrowing 
owl and other night birds in their underground homes. 
He may be seen far up in the mountains and plateaus of 
Bolivia and Chile, where his shrill chattering relieves the 
mountain stillness, but his true home and the place that 
he likes the best is the pampa country of the central Ar- 
gentine. Upon the grassy plains he finds his choicest food 



Fig. 15. An alfalfa stacker at work on 
an Argentine ranch 



44 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

— tender, sweet roots and stems of grasses and herbs. 
In some places a colony of vizcachas will clear away the 
grass about the burrows and make an open space where 
they may play in the sun for hours. When an enemy 
approaches, warning is given, and all the members of 
the colony scurry to their deep-chambered holes. In 
some places the ground is so full of vizcacha holes that 
a horse is scarcely able to walk, and galloping is quite 
impossible. The ranchmen despise this little beast, since 
it not only causes the loss of cattle and horses but also 
kills the grasses by gnawing off the roots. These, like 
the other pests which now prevail, will largely disappear 
with the coming of the permanent settler. 

Birds and Insects of the Pampas. Waterfowl of 
many kinds and in vast numbers are found upon the 
plains, where they congregate about the borders of 
lagoons. Here are the black-necked swan and the 
flamingo, wild duck of many sorts, sandpipers, ibises, 
herons, cranes, and spoonbills. The ornithologist finds 
here an extraordinary field for the study of the habits, 
colors, and shapes of the pamp a birds. On page 24 is a 
description of the hunting of the rhea, or South American 
ostrich, found in great numbers in the Argentine. 

It might seem as if those tiny inhabitants of the plains 

— the ticks, flies, andmosquitos — might go unmentioned, 
for they are far from interesting things to talk about, 
but when we learn that there are whole districts where 
man does not find life endurable because of their presence 
they rise to the dignity of a great natural force. "They 
are nature's miserable castaways, parasitical tribes lost 
in a great dry wilderness where no blood is; and every 
marsh-born mosquito, piping of the hunger gnawing 
its vitals, and every forest tick, blindly feeling with its 
grappling-irons for the beast that never brushes by, 



THE ARGENTINE 45 

seems to tell us of a world peopled with gigantic forms, 
. . . which once afforded abundant pasture to the 
parasite, and which the parasite perhaps assisted to 
overthrow. ' ' (Hudson.) The ' ' gigantic f orms ' ' are those 
mamma ls and reptiles of huge size that once reamed 
these plains, whose bones are now found deeply buried 
by the age-long accumulations of_sand ancl mud out of 
which the pampas are built. 

Hudson has well described the dragon-fly storms that 
come just in advance of the pampero, that strong south- 
west wind of which we have already read. Because they 
are associated with the pampero the dragon flies are 
called "children of the pampa wind." They fly close to 
the surface and in such clouds that the air for ten or twelve 
feet above the earth seems full of them. They rush by 
with great speed and seek the shelter of groves and 
forests, where they cling to the trees until the wind dies 
down. Unlike the locusts (which swarm in like numbers), 
they do not eat the vegetation but fall upon the ticks 
and sand flies, "causing them to vanish like smoke." 

How the Pampas Affect Animals. Out upon the flat 
stretches of the pampas there originally roamed two ani- 
mals of exceptional interest, the guanaco and the vicuila, 
cousins of the llama and alpaca. To-day the vicuna is 
found almost wholly in the mountains, but the guanaco 
still roams the plains, especially in Patagonia. These 
wary animals are exceedingly fleet and are hunted with 
great difficulty. Like the wapiti of our western plains, 
the guanaco has been obliged to develop speed, for the 
open plains do not enable it to find ready hiding places. 
This development of speed is no less a response of the 
animal to the open character of the plains than is the 
burrowing instinct of the vizcacha which enables it to 
hide quickly from an enemy. 



46 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Even those animals that have been brought to the 
pampas from Europe have undergone changes in response 

to the nature of the 
climate and the vege- 
tation of the pampas. 
Thus there has been 
developed a pampa 
breed of sheep hav- 
ing tall, gaunt, bony- 
frames, lean, dry flesh, 
and long, straight wool 
like goat's hair. These 
qualities are far differ- 
ent from those desired, 
and if the animal by 
acquiring them has 
become better able to 
live happily upon the 
pampas he has by just 




Courtesy of Rudolph Schevill 

Fig. i 6. Canvas tent on the Cochico ranch, 

Argentine. The tent is folded up and 

carried from place to place by 

' the herders who drive the cattle 

from one pasture ground 

to the other 



this amount become less suited to man as a source of 
food and clothing. To keep their stock improved the 
breeders of the Argentine must constantly bring in new- 
blood from other countries. Some of the animals intro- 
duced by man have run wild, such as the dog and the 
horse; the wild horse, at one time found in great bands, 
has now all but disappeared. 

The Gauchos. Like our cowboys of the plains the 
gauchos of the Argentine live almost entirely on horse- 
back, a free, rough life full of hardship. The imagination 
of many people who have read about the gaucho a little, 
and seen him not at all, has played with his qualities and 
made him a far more courteous and chivalrous hero than 
he really is. For one must know that not always has 
the gaucho been free from robbery, and his notions of 



THE ARGENTINE 



47 



ownership of cattle have been based largely on the law 
of might makes right. 

The gaucho lives in a simple hut or in a tent and de- 
spises the life of the town ; he is accustomed to the saddle 
from childhood and cares more for the ornaments of 
silver in the reins of his bridle and for the trappings of 
his saddle than for the finest house. His eyesight is as 
keen as that of an Indian; a cloud of dust, the flight of 
birds, the lie of the grass, are to him signs of man or of an 
approaching storm; to him the print of a horse's hoof 
is a subject demanding study, since it may show clearly 
who has passed by. As a type the gaucho is most inter- 
esting, but his day has passed with the passing of much 
of the free range, and like the cowboy of our western 
plains he will soon disappear entirely. In his place 
comes the permanent settler who owns the land on which 
he lives, cultivates the ground for a living, and herds 
cattle as well (Figs. 16, 17, 18, and 19). 

The Pampa Indians. 
The Indians who once 
roamed over the pam- 
pas have almost disap- 
peared from the central 
Argentine. When the 
Spaniards came they 
found several different 
tribes living about the 
borders of the Rio de 
la Plata and the grass- 
lands to the west and 
southwest, and so 
strong were they that 
for a long time 
they prevented the 




Courtesy of Rudolph Schevill 

Fig. 17. Temporary shelter made of 

corrugated sheet iron. It is called a 

"puesto," and when the cattle must be 

driven to a new and fresh feeding 

place the sheet iron is quickly 

taken down and easily set up 

at the next stopping place. 

Ccchico ranch, Argentine 



48 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

whites from settling the interior. They were known as 
Pampa Indians, and were very securely established 
on the south side of the estuary of the Plata. For 
over two centuries they carried on marauding expedi- 
tions against the outlying ranches from Bahia Blanca 
to C6rdoba. They plundered and even killed the settlers, 
stealing thousands of cattle which they sold in large 
part in the Chilean towns west of the mountains. A 
number of military expeditions were sent out to punish and 
subdue them, but without success. At last, in 1879, 
General Roca led a campaign against them which ended 
in the extermination of whole tribes and in the driving of 
others into the remote districts of northern Patagonia. 
Since that time settlements have been made in many 
places within the territory that the Indians once controlled, 
and there is no longer any danger from them. 

The Argentine as One of the World's Granaries. The 
importance and prosperity of a country may be judged 
to some extent by the kind and amount of goods shipped 
out of it. One can scarcely think of Chile without 
thinking of nitrate of soda, of Brazil without thinking of 
rubber and coffee, or of the Argentine without thinking 
of cattle and wheat. The Argentine is one of the impor- 
tant wheat-exporting countries of the world, and in this 
respect may be classed with Russia, the United States, 
and India, which are often spoken of as the granaries of 
the world on account of the breadstuffs they export to 
the numerous manufacturing peoples of Europe who 
cannot raise enough for their own use. About one ton of 
wheat is raised in the Argentine for every man, woman, 
and child in the republic. Besides wheat the Argentine 
exports great quantities of corn, linseed, and beef, all of 
which are shipped to Europe in rapidly increasing amounts. 

A Country with Few Manufactures. The Argentine 



THE ARGENTINE 



49 



is a land where raw materials are the chief products, 
and where manufactured articles — the machinery for the 




Fig. 



Courtesy of 'Rudolph Schevi 

Permanent shelter on an Argentine ranch 



mines, the clothing, knives, guns, and axes — are chiefly 
brought into the country from Europe or the United 
States. Manufactured goods are therefore expensive, and 
any one going to the Argentine will be surprised at the 
cost of such articles as shoes, linens, revolvers, ropes, 
and the like. He will find them costing from twenty to 
fifty per cent more than at home. A sack of grain or a 
cow or a mule, on the other hand, may be bought for less 
than the American would be obliged to pay at home, for 
these, produced in the country, need not be brought in ex- 
pensive steamers across thousands of miles of ocean before 
being offered for sale in the markets of the Argentine. 
It is surprising to one from America or England, where 
most of the manufactured goods are made at home, to 
find that nearly everything used in the Argentine comes 
from abroad. If one ride on the railway it is more 
than likely to be behind an American locomotive, and if 



50 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

one examine the manufacturer's marks on the window 
catches of the coaches or on the car wheels he will find 
them made either in the United States or in England. 
The desks in the business offices, the shoes on the feet 
of the city dweller, the hat he wears, the carriage in which 
he rides, the telephone through which he speaks to his 
neighbor, — all these have been made in France or Ger- 
many or the United States or England. 

Cheap Land and Expensive Coal. One of the principal 
reasons why the people of the Argentine have had to 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 19. Croppers at work in one of the great wheat fields of 
the Argentine Republic 

buy their goods abroad is that there is little coal in the 
country and in those places where most of the people live 
the streams have no falls to be used for generating power. 
Without means for running the machinery which mills 
and factories require, the people have had to buy their 
goods from those countries where manufacturing has 
developed because of a dense population, knowledge of 
inventions, and a large fuel supply. In the Argentine 
there are not enough men to do even the unskilled work 
waiting to be done. Land has in the past been so cheap 
that the poorest newcomer could find a farm if he only 
looked far enough, or he could easily find work on the 
farm of some one who had come before him. Wheat 



THE ARGENTINE 51 

and cattle could be raised so cheaply that it was easier 
to farm or to engage in ranching than to start a manu- 
facturing plant, which requires skilled labor and a cer- 
tain amount of capital. Even if the clothing and the 
tools brought from other countries were expensive, the 
farmer could buy them if only the wheat and the cattle 
with which these were bought could be raised cheaply 
enough. 

One of the Great Cattle Countries. A few years ago, 
before frozen meats were shipped across the ocean, the 
people of Europe needed more meat; the people of the 
Argentine had more than they could use. In one place 
meat was expensive; in the other it was going to waste. 
Before the frozen-meat trade began, cattle were some- 
times of more value for their hides or for the tallow that 
could be obtained from their carcasses than for the meat 
they might yield, and tallow and hides were therefore 
the chief exports from the ranches. The experiment of 
freezing mutton and beef and shipping it in this condition 
to European ports was tried with such success that 
to-day meat in enormous quantities is shipped in this 
manner. 

The first meat-freezing plant in the Argentine was 
established in 1883 on the Rio de la Plata. In 1884 
and 1886 two other plants were opened. In 1883 only 
seventeen thousand frozen sheep carcasses were shipped 
out of the country, but by 1901 the total had risen to 
nearly three million sheep and one hundred and twenty 
thousand cattle. In 1902 two new companies were 
started and in the same year a new company began 
operations with chilled meats. By 1901 the Argentine 
was supplying nearly sixty per cent of the meat imports 
into Great Britain, while Australia was second on the list 
with twenty-one per cent of the imports and New Zealand 



52 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

third with nineteen per cent. Attention is also being- 
paid to dairying, so that to the meat trade we must add 
an important though local trade in butter, milk, and 
cream. 

The attention of the people of the Argentine to the 
grazing industry may also be shown by the fact that the 
country contains about seventy million head of sheep, 
or about nine head for every man, woman, and child in 
the republic; about seven million five hundred thousand 
head of horses, and nearly thirty million head of cattle. 
What these figures mean may be judged from the con- 
ditions in other countries. Australia is the only country 
in the world that contains more sheep than the Argentine. 
Russia and the United States surpass the Argentine in 
the number of horses ; and these two countries and India 
likewise exceed the Argentine in the number of cattle. 
By contrast, the Argentine has only seven and a half 



Fig. 20. i Straight railway track on the flat plains or pampas of the 

Argentine. Railways may be cheaply built on these flat 

plains. There are few cuts or fills, and no expensive bridges 



THE ARGENTINE S3 

million people, while the Russian Empire has a population 
of one hundred and forty million and the United States 
has nearly a hundred million. 

Railways of the Plains. Flat plains have the great 
advantage of being easily crossed by railroads, for there 
are no expensive bridges to build or costly rock-cuts 
to make. If the plains are forested the trees must be 
cut down, but if they are covered with grass a railway 
may be very cheaply constructed across them. And if 
there is enough rainfall to support great herds and flocks 
and farms and plantations the railroad will have much 
business and both it and the farmers and ranchmen it 
serves will be benefited. 

This condition, so near the ideal, is found in the Argen- 
tine. Railways run by the most direct routes from town 
to town without the many curves, tunnels, and bridges 
that are required in a mountainous country. There is 
said to be one stretch of road in the Argentine that for two 
hundred miles is without an important curve (Fig. 20). 
No other country in South America has so large and 
serviceable a railroad system. From Buenos Aires, the 
railroad and commercial heart of the country, railroads 
branch out in all directions over the flat pampas and 
reach far into the western interior, one line reaching 
Santiago and Valparaiso, Chile. 

Bullock Wagons. Before the day of the railroad, men 
could settle out on the plains and carry on farming 
only so far as goods could be sent by bullock wagons. 
It was once no unusual sight to see long trains of slow- 
moving wagons strung out on the great plains of the 
western and central Argentine, moving toward some 
spot favorable for settlement. In each might be seen a 
family of three or four, including children, and all the 
household furniture, clothing, and food. At night a 



54 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

stop was made beside a spring; the children would tumble 
out and help gather brushwood; a roaring fire was built, 
and around it every one sat, the boys piling on fuel, the 
men mending the yokes, the women cooking the food. 
It was hard travel, especially for the children, and some- 
times stops had to be made for the relief of the sick. 
Other wagon trains carried goods from Buenos Aires to 
the interior. For a long time such important interior 
cities as Tucuman, Mendoza, and Cordoba were supplied 
in part by this "ship of the pampas." It was a most 
laborious and costly way of conducting the business of 
transportation, and the development of the country was 
thereby delayed until the railroads came and made it 
possible for settlements to be established anywhere. 

Bullock carts are still used for the local movement of 
goods from farm to railway or from farm to farm, but they 
have nearly gone out of use for long-distance traffic. 
Bullock carts are curious affairs, unlike anything that 
we know in this country except perhaps the prairie 
schooner with its covered roof and great wheels. They 
are two-wheeled vehicles covered with a canopy of cloth 
to protect the driver and his goods. The large size of 
the wheels makes it much easier to cross streams and 
deep ruts. The driver sits on the front of the cart and 
drives his team with shouts and cries and by the generous 
use of a whip. In the old- type wagon a pole goad was 
suspended over the oxen. It was so nicely balanced that 
with a touch of the hand it could be tilted downward, 
whereupon the brads on the end of it pricked the oxen 
and urged them forward (Fig. 105). 

The Railway as a Pioneer. Once the advantages of 
the railway became known it was not long before every 
important town and province in the republic was linked 
with the capital, and to-day there are about twenty 



THE ARGENTINE 55 

thousand miles of railways in the country. In many 
cases the railway was built into new country before there 
were people in it and before ordinary roads were built. 
In this way it has often been the pioneer in the settlement 
of remote districts and a means for the fullest and most 
rapid development. Though there are great tracts that 
are still not reached by- railways, it must be remem- 
bered that cattle can be driven without much difficulty 
for long distances through free range to the railway. 
Thus a single railroad serves as a means of outlet for 
a vast country by enabling the cattle owners to find a 
shipping point at the end of a drive of a hundred miles 
or more. 

For hundreds of miles the railway from Buenos Aires 
to Mendoza runs over a flat pampa, with waving grasses 
or dusty plains stretching out on all sides. At last the 
traveler approaches a green oasis in whose center lies 
one of the oldest, most picturesque, and now one of the 
most important cities of the interior of the Argentine, 
with tree-lined irrigation canals, fertile gardens, and far- 
famed vineyards. 

Beyond Mendoza the railway has now been extended 
across the Andes Mountains, and since 191 1 it has been 
possible to ride from Buenos Aires to Valparaiso entirely 
by rail. 

The importance of this railway across the mountain 
barrier that has so long stood between the Argentine and 
Chile is very great indeed. It connects the shores of two 
oceans, the capitals of two neighboring republics, furnishes 
a means for the cheaper shipment of cattle from the 
pampas of the Argentine to the mining districts of Chile, 
and enables travelers and business men to make a short, 
quick, and comfortable journey across the continent — it 
is but thirty-eight hours from Buenos Aires to Valparaiso. 



56 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

It must not be thought that every part of the Argen- 
tine has a railroad, for the whole of that vast region called 




Fig. 21. A stream bed used as a road in northwestern Argentine. 

Laborers are here removing the stones and bowlders from a 

narrow trail, and this is all the improvement that is 

required to turn the graded flood plain of 

the river into a graded mountain road 

Patagonia, in some parts of which railways are now being 
built, was until recently without a single steel rail. There 
are also vast tracts in the northwestern part of the repub- 
lic which have no other means of shipping goods from 
place to place than those afforded for the past three or 
four centuries — the mule and the burro (Figs. 21 and 22). 
The Region of Mines. A long railway also runs 
northwest to the mining districts of La Rioja, Catamarca, 
and Chilecito in a section of the country more distant 
still from Buenos Aires. Gold, silver, copper, iron, and 
nickel are found here in abundance; one town, Villa 
Argentina, "Silver Town," takes its name from its chief 
product, silver. Some years ago all the ore from Chilecito 



THE ARGENTINE 57 

was sent on muleback to Chile across the deserts and 
mountains. Later the ore was shipped eastward three 
hundred miles in carts, and later still a railway was built 
to the town. The railway now offers cheap means for 
carrying freight; and the region possesses such rich ore 
that it has already become the principal mining region of 
the Argentine. 

By no means all the people of the northwestern part 
of the Argentine are engaged in mining, for those who work 
in mines must be supplied with food. On the fertile 
plains at the foot of the mountains irrigation works have 
been built and the water of the mountain streams turned 
out upon the land. Where water is available the desert 
of stones, sand, and cacti is completely and almost 
magically transformed. Fruits of all kinds thrive, includ- 
ing peaches, figs, pears, and grapes; wheat, wine, and 
oranges are also produced; here too is a profusion of 
flowers, especially roses and lilies. 

A Tramway of Rope. One of the interesting sights of 
the mining region is the rope tramway that runs between 
Chilecito and the mines at Upulungos in the Famatina 
Mountains. The difference in elevation between these 
two places is eleven thousand feet, and the country is so 
broken that it was found too expensive to build an ordi- 
nary railway. The rope road is twenty-one miles long 
and carries ore down to Chilecito and supplies of food 
and machinery up to the mines. There are nine stations 
along the line of this curious tramway, and at each station 
the ropes are anchored so that the strain may be divided. 
The ore cars run on rollers suspended from the ropes, 
and the weight of the loaded down-hill cars carries up the 
lighter return cars, though steam engines at intervals 
along the line also help the movement. 

The rope is suspended from iron trellis girders from 



58 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

ten to one hundred and forty feet high and the spans of 
rope between girders are from three hundred to three 




Fig. 22. Mules bearing packs of sheepskins from the mountains 
of northwestern A rgentine into the valleys 

thousand feet long. The grade of the line is very steep, 
in places as high as thirty per cent. Most interesting 
of all is the fact that at one place a tunnel has been 
constructed as in an ordinary railway, a tunnel fully a 
thousand feet long. 

Watchmen ride the line to prevent theft, for some- 
times a thief selects a time when no one is near and with 
a long pole tips over an ore bucket. On one occasion 
when it was suspected that a thief was about to steal 
ore a watchman curled himself up in a bucket and rode 
down the line. Instead of rich ore the thief tipped out 
a man, who lost no time in handing the thief over to the 
soldier policemen camped at the mine. 

A Coach Trip in the Argentine. To reach places at a 
distance from the railroad one may ride muleback or 
occupy a seat in a coach. A coach trip is very interesting 
to one who has never before traveled in this way. The 



THE ARGENTINE 59 

coach is a huge covered wagon, very much like the old 
coaches our grandfathers used to ride in before the days 
of the railroad/ It will carry from twelve to fourteen 
people, who are crowded three in a seat. Early in the 
morning, before it is yet light, the coach is prepared, the 
baggage is strapped behind and on the roof, and eight 
mules are hitched up in four pairs. The driver, grasping 
the heavy reins, shouts at the top of his voice, stable 
boys throw stones or clods at the mules and whip them 
unmercifully, and away go the mules at a breakneck 
speed. They gallop along mile after mile, sometimes 
turning about the curves of a mountain road almost on 
the edge of a precipice, to the shrieks of the women and 
the consternation of the men. 

By and by the coach arrives at the posthouse, where 
a stop is made for breakfast and for a change of mules. 
Four or five stops like this are made each day; and, by 
using between thirty and forty mules, fifty or sixty miles 
may be covered between sunrise and sunset, even when 
the country is rough and the roads crooked and steep, 
while on the pampas the distance may be seventy or 
eighty miles. 

The Dry Basin Region. In northwestern Argentine is 
the highest and coldest part of the country outside the 
Patagonian Andes. Two great mountain chains here in- 
close a lofty plateau known as the Puna de Atacama. 
Volcanoes and lava flows cover a large part of it, and 
between them are basins containing salt and borax. 
Springs are rare, and as a rule the streams do not flow the 
whole year round. Some of the lakes shown on maps as 
occupying the lowest places in the basins are not lakes at 
all except in the wet season. In the dry winter season 
they are either covered with fine grasses and rushes, or with 
clay, salt, magnesia, or borax. For example, the Laguna 



6o SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



del Portezuelo, shown on some maps as a lake sixty 
to seventy miles long and eighteen to twenty miles 
wide, is in winter a feeding ground for sheep and llamas, 
and one may ride across it from end to end. A few 
scattered houses have been built above the high-water 
mark of the wet season, but the dwellers have a hard 
time finding enough water for their domestic needs. 
The same winter dryness prevails farther south. The 




Fig. 23. Pastoral nomads with flock of sheep and goats on the western 
border of the desert of Atacama 

Laguna de Guatayoc and other lakes are really grassy 
plains in the dry season, except for a central area where 
salt deposits take the place of the grasses. Some of 
these immense salty plains look very much like great 
inland seas. The mirage is almost always to be seen at 
midday; troops of vicuna appear to be standing up to 
their knees in water when they are really feeding on the 
grasses; mounds on the plain appear turned upside 
down; and a sand drift looks like a shimmering pool. 

The Llama Herders. Here and there in the north- 
western basins of the Argentine one comes upon a native 



THE ARGENTINE 61 

hut, a wretched thing of mud and grass, less than twelve 
feet square and six feet high. The dependence of the 
people upon the llama is seen in the corral which is always 
built near the hut and in which the llamas are herded 
every night for fear of the puma that makes his home 
in the mountains near by. The llamas feed upon the 
coarse, spiny, rushlike grasses as well as on the finer 
grasses mixed with them. Llamas and sheep form the 
chief food of the people as well as their source of cloth- 
ing to protect them from the winter cold of the plateau. 
The highest pastures are used only in summer. When 
the winter cold comes on the shepherds leave their 
temporary huts and drive their flocks down to the lower 
valleys (Fig. 23). They are therefore migratory shep- 
herds, though none of them are true nomads since they 
have fixed homes for both seasons of the year. 

The constant tending of their flocks and the immense 
amount of walking this makes necessary have made the 
Indian herders great walkers and runners; their speed 
and endurance are truly marvelous. A man will take a 
message two hundred miles and back in six days for 
about thirty-five cents a day and provide his own food. 
Once a man carried a telegram forty miles to the station, 
received an answer, and brought it back, eighty miles 
in all, in eighteen hours, for the trifling sum of eighty 
cents. Even children are excellent walkers and have 
great endurance. They learn to tend the flocks almost 
from babyhood, and not uncommonly one may see a 
tiny lad of four years herding a flock of big llamas. 

Buenos Aires. We have only three cities in the United 
States that are larger than Buenos Aires. A remarkably 
large portion of all the people of the country, about one 
fifth, live in the capital city. None of the other cities 
even approach this one in size. Indeed, if we should put 



62 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

together all the other cities of the Argentine that contain 
more than six thousand people we would have a city 
only from one half to two thirds the size of Buenos Aires. 

The gathering of so many people into a single town is 
usually deplored by those who believe that the inhab- 
itants of a country should live on the land. While it 
is in part true that the policy of landowners to live in the 
city and leave the management of their great estates to 
superintendents does not favor the best use of the land, 
there is an advantage in the unusual growth of the city 
population. The close association of so many people has 
stimulated the growth of the national spirit to a degree 
far beyond that which the people would otherwise have 
developed. The Argentines have become proud of their 
chief city and willingly endure heavy taxes that it may 
be made beautiful, healthful, and comfortable. A great 
city will support good newspapers, theaters, and public 
buildings, wide, clean streets, comfortable street cars, and 
electric lights. 

These are the signs of civilization, to be sure, and not 
the substance of it, but in the enjoyment of these things 
the Argentine has become broader minded, his ingenu- 
ity has been stimulated, and he has been taught to regard 
his country as one with great opportunities and with a 
great future. The army and navy maneuvers are the 
delight of thousands of sight-seers, and pride has been 
created in the military branch of the government. 
Buenos Aires has in this manner become a force that 
is felt all over the country and without which the seven 
and a half millions of Argentines would not form the 
strong nation that they are to-day. 

Buildings and People. There is in the city of Buenos 
Aires none of the natural beauty that forms so large 
a part of the attraction at Rio de Janeiro (p. 230) or 



THE ARGENTINE 63 

La Paz (p. 152). There are no encircling mountains, no 
island-studded bays, no charm of tropical vegetation. 
The city is laid out in a monotonous chessboard fashion 
on a level plain fronted by the wide La Plata estuary, 
like Chicago on the shore of Lake Michigan. The 
attractiveness of the city lies partly in the cleanness of 
its wide streets, the beauty and size of its great public 
buildings, its parks, and in its business facilities. One 
of the interesting places of the great city is the water 
front, where the ships of many nations come for flour 
and wheat, cattle and sheep (Fig. 24). The Mercado 
Central de Frutos (Fig. 25) is the largest wholesale pro- 
duce market in the world. Palermo Park, one of the 
seventy- two parks in the city, has running streams, 
pretty lakes, and long avenues of beautiful palms. 

Like many other South American cities Buenos Aires has 
large numbers of foreigners. It is said that there are more 
Italians in Buenos Aires than there are native-born 
Argentines. And there are at least a hundred thousand 




Fig. 24. One of the basins in the harbor of Buenos Aires. So crowded 

is the shipping that vessels are often required to lie three or four 

deep on the borders of the artificial basins , 



64 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Spaniards. Nearly every principal tongue is spoken and 
each language has its newspapers. It is a curious fact 



! ^L,.tf^^P^^ 




feSl^ 


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^85 





Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 25. A scene in the Central Market, Buenos Aires 

that the largest Spanish-speaking city in the world 
should be located not in Spain but in America. Buenos 
Aires is almost twice as large as its nearest rival, Madrid, 
though it should be remembered that of this population, 
there are people of many nationalities other "than Spanish. 
The Lights and Buoys of the River Port. The port 
of Buenos Aires has many disadvantages in spite of the 
vast anchorage grounds which the wide estuary affords. 
The so-called Rio de la Plata is really an immense shoal 
estuary and the depositing ground of the great Parana 
River (Fig. 26), which annually sends to the sea nearly 
fifty per cent more water than the Mississippi. So much 
sediment is constantly carried down this great river that 
the delta of the Parana is rapidly advancing into the La 
Plata estuary and in time will fill it completely unless a 
better means is discovered for disposing of the sediment. 



THE ARGENTINE 



65 



Remarkable changes are shown in the position of the 
forty-mile front of this delta on the ninety-two different 
maps of it dating from 1529 to 1885. 

The government has been working for many years to 
improve the estuary for navigation and to accommodate 
the constantly increasing size of the merchant ships. 
Luminous buoys have been placed in the river all the 
way from Buenos Aires to the mouths of the Parana, 
the Bravo, and the Iguassu rivers. A floating semaphore, 
an instrument that tells the navigator the depth of 
water in the channel by night as well as by day, has 
also been installed for the benefit of navigation. So 
important is a knowledge of the height of the water in 
the rivers tributary to the La Plata that the Argentine 
government surveys them constantly and every year 
makes new maps for the river pilots. The government 
each week makes a forecast of the depth of water in the 
various channels based on the study of gauges that 
record the height of the water, and all the stations are 
connected by telegraph. 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 



Fig. 26. Scene on the Parana River 



66 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Sometimes the shifting rivers play queer tricks with 
the work of man, as in the case of the ditch of a market 
gardener some thirty years ago, opposite Ibicuy River. 
The ditch had been dug so that the gardener might take 
his canoe by a shorter course to the main channel, but 
when the next flood came the river overran the ditch 
and deepened it to a channel, and now ocean steamers 
pass through the "Canal del Mercador," or the "canal 
of the merchant," on their way down from Rosario. 

It was in 1885 that the government first began the 
construction of docks at Buenos Aires. Before that time 
all the business was done from an anchorage about 
twelve miles from the city. Passengers and goods were 
transferred from ships to lighters and from lighters to 
small boats and finally to great wheel carts that went 
out long distances from shore. The north channel 
which leads to the docks that now front the city is five 
and a half miles long, three hundred and thirty feet wide, 
and at low tide allows vessels having a draft of twenty- 
one feet to enter. When the tide is high (the tidal range 
is only a few feet at Buenos Aires) vessels drawing twenty- 
seven feet of water may enter. There are only twelve 
ports in the world having a greater tonnage than that 
at Buenos Aires, and none of them has had such an 
extraordinary growth in so short a time (Fig. 24). 

Other Ports of the Argentine. A large part of the 
business of the Argentine is transacted outside of Buenos 
Aires in spite of the exceptional size of that city. Among 
the ports of the republic, Rosario is second and is the 
outlet for a wide area of rich grain-producing country 
in the province of Santa Fe. The port is located on the 
west bank of the Parana and has the advantage of a 
deep-water channel to the edge of the high bank that 
there overlooks the river. The elevated position of the 



THE ARGENTINE 



67 



city enables the easy loading of grain vessels, the chutes 
of the elevators down which the grain slides by gravity 
connecting directly with the holds of the grain, ships. 
Expensive port works, including docks, warehouses, and 
elevators, have also been constructed. With the improve- 
ment of the river so that its channels shall be wider and 
more stable the port of Rosario has a still greater future 
(Fig. 27). Though located far up the Parana, it receives 
ocean-going vessels and thus saves the high cost of a long 
haul by freight train. The chief exports are corn and 
wheat, for which the position of the port is admirably 
adapted. Among the other exports are metals from 
the mines of the north, hides from the pastures of the 




Courtesy of Rudolph S-^hevill 

Fig. 27. Dredging a channel in the Parana River near Rosario. 

The constant shifting of the sand bars makes it necessary to dredge the 

ship channels almost constantly so that navigable channels may be 

maintained. Note the low, flat banks in the distance. These 

are characteristic of the Parana and the Paraguay 



68 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Paraguay, and alfalfa from the grasslands west of the 
city. German, Swiss, and Italian immigrants have 



Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 28. Bird's-eye view of Parana, Argentine Republic 

founded settlements in the country roundabout and have 
built permanent homes. 

Below Rosario are other cities of growing importance, 
such as Villa Constitucion, San Nicolas, Zarate, Campana, 
and San Pedro, while above Rosario are the ports of 
Diamante, Santa Fe, Colastine, Corrientes, and Parana 
(Figs. 28 and 29). 

The New Harbor at Bahia Blanca. On the bay of 
Bahia Blanca, where the Atlantic coast of the Argentine 
makes a great curve to the west, is the harbor and city 
of Bahia Blanca (White Bay). For a long time this 
town was of little importance, but it has recently become 
a center of commercial interest, partly on account of the 
crowded condition of the port of Buenos Aires, partly 
also because of the improvement of the port of Bahia 
Blanca and the development of the surrounding country. 
Argentines are fond of speaking of it as the Liverpool 
of the south, though this name it bears more because of 
its future than because of its present commerce. But a 



THE ARGENTINE 



69 



future it will certainly have, for the Argentine coast has 
only a few really good natural ports, and among these 
Bahia Blanca ranks high. The harbor possesses spacious 
accommodation for the largest ships and an entrance so 
narrow as to be easily defended in case of war. The 
railway systems are being put into better connection with 
Bahia Blanca and have already turned in that direction 
a great deal of commerce from a region which was once 
tributary to Buenos Aires. 

A Seacoast Country without a Fishing Fleet. With 
all its long stretch of Atlantic coast, the Argentine has 
not a single important fishing station. In some places 
the reason for this condition is easy to see, as on the 
coast of Patagonia, where the tides are so high that fish- 
ing operations would have to be carried on under extreme 
difficulties, though this will not explain the condition 
everywhere. There are excellent fish in the sea and a 
ready market for them in the coast towns, but a race of 
fishermen has not yet been produced nor are the new 
settlers fisherfolk. 

The lack of a fishing people in the Argentine Republic 
is felt in the development of the navy, whose sailors are 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

FiG. 29. General view of Corrientes, Argentine Republic 



70 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

not drawn largely from fishing districts, as in other coun- 
tries, but from the army, the National Guard. New and 
cheap land close to good markets has been so easily 
obtained by the incoming settler that he has found no 
attraction in fishing. 

The Flooded River Country, The two great eastern 
streams, the Parana and the Paraguay, are of much 
importance to the people of the region they drain and 
are the only natural highways of travel and trade. In 
their lower courses both rivers have a very uncertain 
behavior. The Paraguay is especially unreliable. For 
the most part it runs in an alluvial bottom as wide as 
the English Channel. In the season of flood all the 
bottom land is submerged, cut-offs occur, sand banks 
form and reform, and the whole course of the main stream 
may be found to have been changed when the floods 
subside. During the season of high water, which is three 
months of the year, the river country is so completely 
flooded that only groves of trees stand as islands above the 
swamps and lakes that border the main stream. Down 
this ever-changing channel the trade of the Chaco of 
Bolivia must find its way, and, capricious as the river is, 
it enables man to enter the country by boats for more 
than two thousand miles above Buenos Aires. 

The Grasslands of the Parana Valley. While a large 
part of the Parana region is tropic forest, there are also 
vast savannas where the richest pastures are to be found. 
These lie between the open flats of the Paraguay River 
and the forested valleys of the upper Parana. They 
commence in scattered pastures upon the hills of central 
Paraguay and run in widening extent northward along 
the Maracayu to Cuyaba, where they merge with the 
grasslands of the sandstone plateau . of Matto Grosso 
that forms a part of the great interior plateau of Brazil. 



THE ARGENTINE 71 

The upland pastures afford grazing for live stock during 
the greater part of the year, but in the dry summer 
months the flocks and herds must be driven down to the 
lowlands, where they feed upon the young tussock grass 
and wild grain. 

The unoccupied grazing lands of Matto Grosso and 
Goyaz alone cover an area as large as the state of Texas 
and possess a grazing value fully equal to that of Texas. 
The value of the grazing lands accessible to the markets 
that use cattle for the frozen-meat and jerked-beef trade 
has risen in recent years because of the rise in the price 
of cattle. There is in consequence a steady stream of 
squatters passing northward by way of lower Misiones 
and Paraguay. They drive troops of mares, mules, and 
horses, and carry their household goods and women. 
At Posadas they pass at the rate of two hundred a 
month. They come from the regions farther down the 
valleys where for many years they were permitted to 
"squat," that is, use the land without really owning it or 
paying taxes or rent to any one, but from which they were 
obliged to move because the real owners of the land no 
longer allowed them on it. The owners of the lands 
whence the squatters are being driven have found their 
land suddenly valuable because of the steadily growing 
importance of the frozen- and chilled-meat industry in 
the Argentine and Uruguay. 

Thus, remote as these grasslands are from the sea, 
they are after all far more valuable than the forest lands 
of the upper Parana which lie much nearer the sea, for 
man can travel about in grasslands, can produce cattle 
upon which to depend for food and money, and find 
a. climate far more healthful than in the damp forests. 
Even the wood of the grasslands is more easily obtained 
than that of the forest where it grows in such abundance. 



72 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The scattered groves and belts of timber along the water 
courses are easily reached and the timber may be taken 
over an easy route as compared with the difficulty of 
carting it through a jungle. With railways and wagon 
roads the lands most available for colonization are those 
located along the fringe where the forest ends and the 
plains begin, for here are both timber and pasture, as 
well as a climate that makes diversified farming possible. 



CHAPTER V 
THE VALLEYS OF CENTRAL CHILE 

The Yankees of South America. The people of 
central Chile live in the cool zone of South America where 
the climate is pleasant (Plate III). It is neither so hot as 
to weaken a man through disease nor so cold as to require 
all his energy to procure a food supply. The effect of 
these climatic conditions has been to make the people of 
central Chile very energetic. In spite of its small size 
Chile is one of the most important countries of South 
America. Its army and navy are the pride of every 
Chilean and compare very well with an equal number of 
the armed forces of Germany or the United States. The 
beautiful Chilean horses are as good as may be found 
anywhere and give the cavalry a fine appearance on the 
Sunday parades that are held throughout the year. In 
the war with Peru in 187 9- 1883, Chile quickly overcame 
the small Peruvian navy, defeated one army after another, 
and at last took Lima and held it until the end of the 
war. To see a battalion of the Chilean army go marching 
down the streets of Santiago is to see one of the finest 
military sights in South America. A troop of cavalry in 
Chile is able to parade or fight with much the same vigor 
and success as a troop of the emperor's guard in the days 
of Napoleon or von Moltke. 

The energy of the Chileans is shown in many other 
ways than those relating to the army and navy. The 
industry and ingenuity of the people are exhibited in their 
schools and colleges, their railroads and wagon roads, their 
streets and parks (Fig. 30), their everyday business, and 
their relations with their neighbors. The Chileans are well 
aware of their own progressive qualities and are so proud 

73 



74 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

of them that they call themselves the Yankees of South 
America. To them the word ' ' Yankee' ' means a person of 









vir 






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; 






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Fig. 30. Central plaza at Copiapo, Chile 

energy and ingenuity, and, as they use the word, it also 
means a wide-awake citizen of the United States. They 
admire the way in which the United States has pros- 
pered; the energy that we display has always been a 
matter of interest in South American countries. 

A Long, Narrow Country. A more peculiar distribution 
of national land cannot be found than that in Chile: 
Think of a country so long that if one end of it were placed 
upon New Orleans the other end would reach the Arctic 
Circle, and yet so narrow that one could cross it in a 
few days on foot. The widest place is at the Strait of 
Magellan, where it is two hundred and fifty miles from 
east to west; the narrowest part is near Hanover Island, 
where it measures but sixty miles across. The total area 
of Chile is three times that of Illinois and Indiana, but 
the length of the country is equal to the distance 
from Alaska to southern Mexico. Its shape and size 
have been determined partly by war and conquest but 



THE VALLEYS OF CENTRAL CHILE 75 

more largely by its position on a narrow strip of country 
between the lofty Andes Mountains and the sea. Lofty 
mountains are difficult to pass. People visit them for 
the grand scenery they display, but few live in them, as 
a rule, for, if we except mineral deposits, thin pastures, 
and possibly a little timber, they are without resources to 
attract men. 

The Andes Mountains that confine Chile to the seacoast • 
are among the few really lofty highlands of the world. 
Aconcagua is perhaps the loftiest mountain in the western 
hemisphere. Its peak reaches .up into the region of 
eternal snows, attaining an altitude of over twenty-three 
thousand feet. Aconcagua lies on the boundary between 
Chile and the Argentine. North and south of it are 
ranges and groups of lofty volcanic peaks whose bare, 
cold surfaces repel the settler and the traveler alike. A 
vacant region such as this is an ideal boundary between 
nations. There are as a rule no close neighbors whose 
rights or quarrels may bring two governments into 
dispute and possibly into war with each other. Neither 
are there likely to be natural sources of wealth to cause 
difficulty. 

Yet Chile and the Argentine have in the past had several 
serious arguments and threatened wars over boundary 
claims. The boundary treaty between the two republics 
says that the boundary south of the 40th parallel must 
follow the principal peaks and divides between the east- 
and west-flowing streams. These are, however, so 
irregular that the words of the treaty are not always easy 
to apply. Some of the Chilean rivers have cut clear 
through the mountain range and now head on the plains 
east of the mountains, a region that the Argentine has 
always claimed. The trouble became acute a few years 
ago, and both sides prepared for war. Fleets were 



76 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

made ready, soldiers drilled, and both nations became 
very much inflamed by warlike speeches. At last better 
counsels prevailed. Surveyors were employed to study 
the country thoroughly, and the king of England decided 
the case on the basis of the survey. Both sides accepted 
his award, and to commemorate the peaceful settlement 
there was raised on the divide between Chile and the 
Argentine a colossal statue of the Christ. It was cast from 
old Spanish cannon left there about eighty years before.. 
On it is this inscription: "Sooner shall these mountains 
crumble into dust than Chileans and Argentines shall 
break this peace which at the feet of Christ, the Redeemer, 
they have sworn to maintain" (Fig. 31), 
The Valley of Paradise. The Spaniards explored the 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 31. " Christ of the Andes." Monument erected on the boundary 
line between Chile and the Argentine Republic, after a 
boundary qiiarrel that once threatened war 



THE VALLEYS OF CENTRAL CHILE 77 

desert coast of northern Chile in ships built at Panama — 
tiny caravels which, beside the ocean liners of to-day, 
would look like the boats of children. They coasted 
southward, hundreds of miles, and for most of the way 
were in sight of a stern desert coast. At last they came 
to the end of the desert. They had reached the northern 
edge of the belt of westerly winds in Chile where the 
more constant rains support a covering of green vege- 
tation. So overjoyed were they at finding themselves 
once more in a land of trees and green grass that their 
enthusiasm was intense, especially when they reached 
the first green valley, which they called the " Valley of 
Paradise," or as it is spelled in Spanish, "Valparaiso," 
to-day the greatest commercial port of Chile (Fig. 32). 

The Fertile Valley of Central Chile. The land beyond 
the desert which so delighted the eyes of the early Span- 
ish explorers is now often known as southern Chile. 
Strictly speaking, it should be called central Chile, and 
such we shall designate it here, for the real southern end 
of Chile is composed of islands and peninsulas without 
number, and although it is wooded and has an abundant 
vegetation it has actually fewer people to-day than has 
an equal area of the desert of Atacama in northern Chile. 

Central Chile is wholly different from the northern and 
southern extremities of the country since it lies between 
the two extremes of heat and aridity on the one hand and 
cold and heavy rainfall on the other. This seems indeed 
a "valley of Paradise" when its mild climate, fertile soil, 
and refreshing rains are compared with the harsh conditions 
one finds in the regions on the north and the south. 
This is the part of the country that attracted the earliest 
settlers, and here we find the great majority of Chileans 
to-day. Although central Chile embraces but one fifth 
of the entire country, it contains four fifths of the people. 



78 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



There is but one inhabitant to every two square miles 
of country in northern desert Chile, and less than that 
number in the south, but there are seventeen to each 
square mile in the central section. 

In the central section of Chile are almost all of the 
schools, colleges, and universities of the nation, the 
great cities and railways, and many of the ports and 
manufacturing plants (Fig. 33). This is also the land of the 
gardener, the farmer, and the herder. In this section are 
produced a large part of the grain and hay shipped north 
for the animals employed in the mines and the nitrate 
fields of the desert. Here are raised the animals which 
are purchased in great numbers and shipped north, the 
cattle for meat and the horses for draft animals. Wheat 
and corn are produced in great quantities, and steel and 
flour mills have been built. 

Upon the mountain sides where the land is too steep 
for cultivation, and the soil too thin, are pastured great 




Fig. 32. Monument to Prat y Bahia, Valparaiso, Chile 



THE VALLEYS OF CENTRAL CHILE 



79 



droves of sheep and herds of cattle. It is here that we 
find the ranchmen of Chile. Their flocks and herds go 



■ ■ 




■ - "V-* 



Fig. 33. Street scene in central Chile 

far up into the mountains in summer, when the lower 
pastures are withered or scanty, to graze on the short 
rich grasses nourished by the winter rains and snows; in 
the winter time they are driven down into the valleys. 
Some are slaughtered for food, others are shipped into 
regions where cattle are not kept, still others supply 
milk, butter, and cheese in very limited quantities to 
their owners, or to the people of the towns. 

Central Chile also produces large quantities of wine, 
and the lands which support this industry are of great 
extent. In the central valley south of Santiago there are 
miles upon miles of vineyards (Fig. 34). During the 
grape-gathering season the vineyards are dotted with grape 
pickers. It is the busiest and happiest season of the year, 
with singing and dancing every evening. The harvest 
gathered, the manufacture of the wine begins. It is 



So SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

made in almost numberless varieties, stored in bottles and 
casks and prepared for shipment. All Spanish-speaking 




Fig. 34. Vineyard in central Chile 

peoples are addicted to the use of wine, the most com- 
mon of the social beverages. Its universal use means the 
support of the wine industry not only of Chile but of the 
Argentine as well, and in addition great quantities of it 
are imported from California, Peru, France, and Italy. 

The Scenery of Southern Chile. In clear weather 
the southern end of Chile is the most picturesque part 
of the entire country. Lofty mountains border a steep, 
irregular shore. At the extreme southern end of the region 
it is so cold that there are numerous snow fields feeding 
glaciers that in places extend far down the mountain 
valleys and even to the sea. At the Strait of Magellan, 
which belongs to Chile, the mountain-bordered shore is 
a marvel of coastal scenery. On the lower slopes are 
dense forests of beech and oak, higher up are the stunted 
alpine plants of the zone of cold, while the peaks and crests 
of the mountains are without vegetation of any sort, the 
surface consisting either of bare, cold rock or of snow 



THE VALLEYS OP CENTRAL CHILE 81 

fields. The contrast between dark forest and white snow 
and ice, between green sea and blue or gray cloud-covered 
sky is one of the charming aspects of a view which is 
perhaps the most striking and certainly one of the most 
beautiful in all South America. 

The bold coast and the fine scenery of the Strait of 
Magellan extend with some variations for several hundred 
miles northward. The shore is island-fringed through- 
out. So numerous are the islands and islets that even 
the government officials who have surveyed and studied 
many of them do not know exactly how many there are. 
That there are thousands upon thousands is however 
well known. Between the islands and the mainland are 
great numbers of channels, straits, and bays, all very 
deep, for these islands represent the tops of mountains 
whose bases are far below the level of the sea. When one 
sails about the islands he sails about mountain tops, 
not in air as one might sail about mountain tops in a 
balloon or an airship, but on water in which the moun- 
tains have been half drowned. There are few good 
beaches; the shore consists rather of bold cliffs or steep 
mountain sides upon which the sea has as yet done but 
little work. 

Everywhere throughout the region are dense forests of 
beech and oak. So close do the trees stand, and so rank 
is the growth of leaves, vines, and underbrush, that one 
appears to be in a tropical rather than a temperate-zone 
forest. The dense growth is due to the heavy rainfall. 
The sky is almost continually overcast; rainstorms are 
of almost daily occurrence. It is stated that in some 
places over two hundred inches of rain fall every year. 
Some people who know the region well, speak of it humor- 
ously as a place where it rains thirteen months in the year 
and where men become web-footed! Naturally people 



82 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

have not been attracted to the region, and government 
officials at the extreme south are given half time off with 
full pay. Some lumbering is now carried on in a few 
places, but as a whole the region is without an important 
population, — a wilderness of intricate waterways, primi- 
tive forests, and picturesque mountains. 

Any country is fortunate which has important 
deposits of coal to run its railroad trains and factories. 
South American countries are as a rule unfortunate in 
having little or no coal. Brazil and the Argentine, the 
two largest countries, are obliged to import all the coal 
they use, and it is very expensive. In this respect Chile 
is more fortunate. Large deposits of good coal (soft) 
occur in the provinces of Arauco and Concepcion. 
Coronel, Lota, and Valdivia, south of Santiago and 
Punta Arenas, on the Strait of Magellan, are the principal 
coal centers, though development is active at only the 
three first named. By far the larger part of the coal 
used in Chile must be brought from other countries 
— chiefly Wales and Australia; and the use of coal is' 
rapidly increasing. Between 1903 and 1907 the con- 
sumption of coal doubled. The home production is still 
too small (about a million tons) greatly to affect the 
price. A ton of soft coal costs from eight to ten dollars 
in gold. 

From i860 to 1864 Chile was the greatest copper- 
producing country. Its annual output was then from 
sixty to seventy per cent of the total output of the 
copper mines of the world. The copper districts of 
that day, at Copiapo and Coquimbo, were the richest 
and most progressive in all Chile. Thus in 185 1 the 
first railway in Chile was built from the port called 
Caldera to the town of Copiapo in the center of a. rich 
copper and silver, region. One of the first theaters in 



THE VALLEYS OF CENTRAL CHILE 83 

Chile was built at Copiapo (Fig. 30) at about the same time. 
Chile is still a large copper-producing country but it is 
no longer the first. At Chuquicamata in northern Chile 
there is a whole mountain of copper ore only a hundred 
miles from the coast. The ore will be excavated in 
open pits by steam shovels and transported over a special 
ore railroad to the coast, where it will be smelted. The 
product will be distributed among northern countries, 
chiefly by way of the Panama Canal. Copper will soon 
be produced by the millions of pounds and at a very 
cheap rate, since no expensive mine timbering or tunneling 
and blasting will be required. Southeast of Santiago, 
at Braden, are other deposits almost equally extensive, 
and many of the old mines, of which there are hundreds, 
are still producing important amounts of ore. Next to 
nitrate, copper is the most important mineral production 
of Chile. The total exports of the country are valued 
at nearly ten million dollars. 



CHAPTER VI 
THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 

A Long, Narrow Desert between Mountains and Sea. 

We have already seen that South America has the south- 
ernmost people in the world, the Yaghans and Onas of 
Tierra del Fuego, and the southernmost city in the 
world, Punt a Arenas. It has also the loftiest large 
lake — Titicaca — twelve thousand five hundred feet 
above the sea; the largest river, the Amazon; and one 
of the longest deserts, the so-called west-coast desert. 
The length of this desert exceeds sixteen hundred miles, 
a distance as great as from Chicago to the Arctic Ocean 
or from the equator to Florida. Yet its width is in 
few places more, and in most places less, than a hun- 
dred miles. One can cross it in two days of hard riding 
by mule caravan, but the coast steamers generally spend 
from two to three weeks between Payta, Peru, and 
Valparaiso, Chile, the two extremities of the desert. 

The Features of a Desert. A desert is popularly 
regarded as a place where no rain falls — a lifeless plain 
of yellow sand. As a matter of fact there is no rainless 
desert upon the whole earth; and while many deserts 
have vast, flat, sand-covered plains, all deserts have hills 
and valleys as well. It is a common mistake to suppose 
that deserts are without inhabitants, for while some parts 
of all deserts are truly deserted, there is no known desert 
wholly without people. It is also noteworthy that the 
life of all deserts is highly specialized: the plants have 
thick bark or leaves, or hairs, thorns, and deeply pene- 
trating roots; the animals have sharpened senses and 
adaptations for sustaining life with a limited supply of 

84 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP CHILE AND PERU 85 




water; and the primitive people of the desert generally 
have interesting ceremonies which they believe will bring 
rain. 

There are with- 
in the borders of 
the west-coast 
desert of South 
America moun- 
tains from fifteen 
thousand to eigh- 
teen thousand feet 
high, hundreds 
of thousands of 
people, and a large 
variety of plants 
and animals that 
find food and shel- 
ter in its valleys 
and plains. More- 
over while the west-coast desert is often described as rain- 
less, some rain actually does fall. The amount is never 
great, and while one spot may have several showers a year 
a neighboring spot may be without rain for many years. 
Since it never rains on the moon a traveler has suggested 
that in parts of the west-coast desert where no rain has 
fallen for many years, curious people, who wonder what 
the moon's surface would look like, might get a very 
fair notion of it. 

The west-coast desert owes its origin to the mountains 
and the winds. The lofty Andes shut off the moist south- 
east trade-winds or break them up into a complex system 
of shifting winds that follow the trend of cross valleys and 
ridges (Figs. 35 and 36). Furthermore, the moisture of 
the trades is deposited on the eastern slopes of the Andes 



Fig. 35. Sail-car on the Antofagasta- 

Bolivia Railway near Calama, Chile. 

The men push the car out to their work 

in the morning and at night raise 

the sail and blow back into town 



86 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

and the westward-moving air descends upon the coastal 
region so dry that no rain can fall from it. The eastern 
slopes are therefore clothed with dense forests; the 
western slopes are so dry as either to support no vege- 
tation at all or only low shrubs, mosses, thin grasses, 
and cacti. If the region were not in the zone of the 
steady trades the wind would blow for several days at a 
time from the sea and rain would fall where now the 
desert prevails. More rain would fall also if it were not 
for the cold Humboldt Current near shore. This cools 
the air over it to so low a temperature that when, as in 
the afternoon, the wind blows for a few hours from the 
sea to the land, it is heated by the land about as much 
as it is cooled by rising on the flanks of the coastal moun- 
tains. There would be a desert here even if the Humboldt 
Current did not exist, but the cold current makes the 
aridity more intense. 

The west-coast desert receives the equivalent of a 
slight rainfall from the almost constant mist that hangs 
like a cloud bank over the edge of land and sea. The 




: ; 










': 








' 






' 


.' ; '>:^VM- 








„_ 




■■] 







Fig. 36. Wind ripples on the surface of a sand dune, Atacama Desert 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 87 

natives say it is the ''poncho," or cloak of the sea nightly 
drawn over its head. Water particles from the mist 




Fig. 37. A caravan starting on a journey across the desert of Tarapacd 

cover are collected upon the leaves and stems of plants 
and a small quantity is also absorbed by the soil. From 
these slender sources enough moisture is derived to 
nourish a small number of plants. The amount is gen- 
erally small, but in some places, as at Mollendo, Peru, 
it is enough to support grasses upon which feed a consid- 
erable number of mules, donkeys, goats, and even cattle. 
East of Antofagasta a small oasis is maintained by this 
means and enough moisture collects in the spoon-shaped 
cactus leaves to supply the goats with the little drinking 
water they need. Where the coastal mountains are higher, 
as for example east of the port of Camana, Peru, there is 
some rainfall during the southern winter ; and at intervals 
of several years it is fairly abundant. In contrast to the 
surrounding desert the mountain slopes are here covered 
with a thick carpet of grass and flowers. Hundreds of 
cattle are driven to the rich pastures from near and far 
to grow fat before the returning sun dries up the soil and 
withers the grasses. 

Desert Travel and " Signs of the Way." In such a dry 
desert as that on the west coast of South America it is 
difficult to travel any distance from the railroads that 



SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




tap the larger valleys, the nitrate fields, and the mines. 
One must carry all one's food or depend upon the 

very uncer- 
tain supply 
which can be 
found in 
small, scant- 
ily watered 
oases on the 
way. The 
view (Fig. 37) 
of a caravan 
or pack train 
crossing the 
desert of 
Tarapaca in 
northern 
Chile shows 
not only how 
lifeless part 
of the coun- 
try is but how well provided the traveler must be with 
the necessaries of life. These men are beginning a 
journey of several weeks and have brought along not 
only bedding, tents, fuel, and heavy clothing for the 
cold nights, but also food of all kinds in tins, vegetables 
from the nearest oases, and enough drinking water to 
last them until they reach the next spring. They travel 
with an Indian guide who knows the way from one camp 
site to another. If darkness overtakes them too far 
from a village, and they do not wish to travel all night, 
they camp in some sheltered spot and sleep on the bare 
ground. Their guide curls up under a bush or in the 
corner of a stone corral and has no covering but a thin 



Fig. 38. A mountain trail in the Maritime Andes 

in northern Chile. A heap of stones called 

" signo del camino" guides the traveler 

in those places where the trail 

is hidden in the sand 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 89 

blanket, though in the mountains east of the desert, 
whither the travelers are bound, he is at times buried in 
snow when he wakes. 

The trails of the desert are in many places covered with 
sand and difficult to find, so that signs of the way, called 
signos del camino, are 
erected. These are 
nothing more than 
heaps of stones piled 
beside the trail and 
so large as never to 
be obscured by sand 
(Fig. 38). Some of 
them are of great size, 
each traveler adding p IG< ^g. A wayside cross on one of the 
a Stone or two that desert roads of northern Peru 

he may have a safe journey. If the signos are on a 
mountain pass the Indians sometimes leave beside them 
small offerings to their deities, such as a candle or a piece 
of meat or some wool, to bring good luck. Once in a 
while one may see erected over a heap of stones a cross 
bearing the inscription "INRI," which means, "Jesus 
of Nazareth, King of the Jews" (Fig. 39). 

Fig. 40 shows four parties of desert travelers pitching 
camp beside a pool of water. A dead mule shows oh 
the left. The water on the right is covered with a green 
scum and is salty, but it is all that may be had within 
many miles. After a long, hot ride it is better to use 
water like this than make a "dry camp," for without 
water it is impossible to eat dry food, which only increases 
one's thirst. 

From Tropic Forest to Barren Desert. Of all the 
interesting features of the west coast of South America 
none is perhaps more lasting in the mind of the traveler 



90 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

than the startling suddenness with which he comes upon 
the coastal desert in sailing south from Ecuador. The 




Fig. 40. Pack trains and desert travelers making camp beside 
a desert pool 

last port at which the steamer touches before reaching 
the desert is Guayaquil. There may be seen every sign 
of abundant and timely rains. The hill slopes behind the 
city are green with foliage, there is abundant pasturage 
for the cattle and mules outside the town, and the banks 
of the Guayas River are deeply fringed with dense tropical 
vegetation. The next morning the scene has changed 
completely, for in a single night one has passed the 
boundary between "the desert and the sown." At the 
northern end of the great coast desert of South America 
there are practically no streams, for the region is nearly 
rainless; there is so little vegetation that at a distance 
the landscape seems bare and yellow; in place of herds 
of cattle as at Guayaquil one sees here only a few small 
flocks of scrawny goats that somehow pick a scanty living 
from the dry and extremely tough vegetation that sur- 
vives the desert dryness. 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP CHILE AND PERU 91 



A Typical Desert Port. The first port of call for vessels 
southward bound along the ocean border of the desert is 
Payta, a typical desert port (Fig. 41). It lies in a bend 
of the Peruvian coast and is built at the foot of the 
bluffs that border the shore. There are nearly always a 
few vessels at anchor in the harbor, receiving and dis- 
charging cargoes of merchandise including rice, clothing, 
and implements. A railway leads eastward out of the 
town, and there is an air of business and importance about 
the place quite foreign to the sterile desert about it. One 
looks in vain for any sign of vegetation, yet there are fine 
vegetables in the market booths. Surely the desert does 
not supply the great packages of skins taken on board 




Fig. 41. A British steamer with Chinese rice at Payta, Peru. The 

small raft in the foreground is a "balsa," used for making short 

trips along the shore and in sailing out to meet an 

incoming steamer. It is made of bamboo and is very 

light. The ocean here is so quiet that no storms 

ever occur and even a small boat is safe 



92 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the steamer ! Large quantities of rice and cotton are 
shipped abroad, but where are they grown? How does 
such a small port maintain such an important trade? 

The Nile of Northern Peru. Our questions will be 
answered if we but follow the railway leading toward 
the interior. A few hours' ride across a barren and almost 
lifeless plain of sand and we arrive at Piura, one of the 
most interesting cities in all South America. Upon it 
depends almost the entire prosperity of the port of 
Payta. Up and down the far-famed valley of the Piura 
River are the plantations and farms of the people, with 
irrigation ditches leading the water of the river out upon 
the fields where rice, sugar cane, and especially cotton 
are grown. Without the life-giving river all would be dry 
and barren. What the Nile is to Egypt, what the Indus 
and the Ganges are to the people of India, so in its 
small way is the Piura to the people of northwestern 
Peru. Small wonder they regard it with a feeling akin to 
reverence. 

A Feast Day for a River. It is not surprising there- 
fore that the people of Piura have a great feast day on 
account of the river. Once a year when the mountain 
snows are being melted and the summer rains return, 
the sources of the Piura are fed with precious water. 
The river gradually rises as the flood moves downstream, 
spreading over and enriching the valley bottom and 
feeding the irrigation ditches that in turn water the 
fields. Long before the flood arrives the people ask 
every traveler from upstream where the river is and how 
fast the flood is coming, and in this way they learn when 
the river will arrive. 

On the day when the beneficent river is due the people 
of Piura, men, women, and children, usually about five 
thousand in number, march upstream in a body to meet 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 93 

and welcome the river. This is the great fiesta or feast 
day of the year. With fife and drum they escort the 
river down to the main bridge of the town, some miles 
below Piura. At Catacaos (south of Piura) more than 
five thousand people take part in a similar feast and with 
much rejoicing welcome the river to their fields and 
gardens. Upon this muddy, silt-laden, and sluggish 
stream, not at all beautiful to the eye, depend the 
welfare and prosperity of a great many people. The 
river is to them, in a sense, a harvest. If there is abun- 
dant water there will be abundant food; if there is little 
water some of the people will suffer want. 

Rain Once in Seven Years. The people of Piura have 
another source of water supply besides the river. Once 
every five or ten years there are a few showers, for which 
the people eagerly wait. They are called the seven-year 
rains. While they do not occur quite so regularly as 
every seven years they are, after all, tolerably regular in 
their appearance. Every few years the equatorial rain 
belt which waters the country north of the desert, where 
such abundant vegetation may be found, migrates farther 
south than usual and brings a few showers to the thirsty 
land, causing a most wonderful burst of life. Everywhere 
the faint green tinge of the short, quick-growing grasses 
may be seen, fragrant blossoms of many flowers fill the 
air with sweetness, and for a few weeks a barren country 
becomes beautiful. By the end of that time the water 
has evaporated or sunk underground, the hot sun shrivels 
the grasses and flowers, and once more the region has 
become a yellow desert. Fig. 42 shows a street in Payta 
where fruits and vegetables are sold and where many 
people come and go. It is but a stream channel adapted 
to the purposes of a street. One would not think it a 
very safe place for a street, but as it rains only once in 



94 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



five or ten years people using it are seldom inconvenienced 
by running water. 
The Best Cotton in the World. It is a familiar fact 




Fig. 42. A stream channel in Payta, Peru, used as a street. As it 

rains but once in seven years at Payta, the people are not 

ojten troubled by the running water that keeps the channel open 

to people who are well acquainted with the habits of 
plants that differences of soil and climate from place to 
place result in certain differences of qualities, either of 
color, or size, or taste, in a given plant. Thus the famous 
Havana tobacco leaf is produced only in western Cuba. 
Likewise certain exceptionally good brands of coffee and 
certain kinds of cotton can be produced only in special 
places. Piura is noted for the kind of cotton grown in 
that remarkable valley. " Piura cotton is known among 
cotton merchants for the. peculiar strength of the long 
fibers," which gives it a high value. The market price of 
Piura cotton is nearly twice as great as that of the ordinary 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP CHILE AND PERU 95 

kind grown in the United States or in India. It is eagerly 
sought for use in making special grades of cotton cloth 
and for mixture with wool. 

Goat Herds of the Piura Valley. The famous Piura 
cotton is, however, not the sole product of this fertile 
valley. A great deal of sugar cane is grown also. It is 
not all used as we use it here, in making sugar and molasses. 
Some of it is eaten raw, or rather, sucked after chewing, 
for the natural sweet sap it contains. Since sugar cane 
stands transportation very well it is bound into bundles 
and taken on the backs of burros and mules across the 
desert to many other towns where it is not produced, and 
there sold as a delicacy. Goats are also raised for their 
skins, which bring about two dollars apiece, delivered on 
board the steamer. 

Goats are peculiarly adapted to the desert because 
they are able to live upon very poor and dry food which 
would otherwise be lost because no other animal would 




Fig. 43. Flock of goats and shepherds at Payta, Peru, at the northern 

end of the Desert of Atacama. They feed on the tough 

desert shrubs that grow here and there in clumps in 

the sandy waste 



9 6 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

or could eat it. They browse upon the very dry resinous 
shrubs of the desert, eating the softer parts; consume 
great quantities of the bean of the algarroba* kind of 
Lust lee; and feed on such waste parts of barley and 
other forage crops as ordinary animals refuse. 



also herded upon the desert, where they range m .flock 
that scour the yellow plain in search of food and that are 
sometimes several weeks without water (Fig. 43)^ ^^ 



Other Desert Ports. The steamer sailing south along 
the coast of Pern stops at many desert ports and at each, 
one sees as at Payta very much the same relation between 
the port on the arid coast and the fertile interior yaltey 
watered by a mountain stream. Fig. 44 represents he 
port of Salaverry, whose harbor, like all those on the 
desert coast of Peru, except Callao, the ^gest and best 
of them all, is little more than an open roadstead, ft this 




Fig 44. The port of Salaverry, Peru. Nothing at all grows in the 

tain; but a jew miles north of it is a fertile valley which 

supplies the port 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 97 

were a stormy sea like that off the coast of southern Chile 
or the eastern coast of the United States it would be one 




Fig. 45. Hauling water at Taltal, Chile 

of the most dangerous in the world. Mariners find 
scarcely any natural protection for hundreds of miles. 
There are no deep bays or sheltering promontories, almost 
no islands behind which ships can seek shelter and outride 
a storm, and but few lighthouses, — a bold, harborless, 
shelterless coast. 

But few storms ever ruffle the surface of the Pacific 
in the latitudes of the coasts of Peru and northern Chile. 
It is a serene and beautiful tropical sea. For this reason 
the early Spanish navigators called it "Oceano Pacifico," 
which means the peaceful, calm, or quiet ocean. The 
only motion of its waters is a smooth and constant roll, 
increasing in size as the shore is approached. The surf 
is heavy and landing in small boats is very difficult, and 
in places even dangerous. Steamers and sailing craft 
therefore anchor some distance from shore, and discharge 
their cargoes into lighters called launches that are rowed 
to a steel mole or wharf that extends into the sea. 



9 8 



SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



In the port of Taltal, Chile, the city reservoir is located 
on a hill, and pipes are run down from it to convenient 




Fig. 46. Hauling water from railroad to mines, Chile 

stations in the city. To these stations people must 
come for their daily water supply. Some carry it away 
in buckets, others in two-wheeled carts, and still others 
in barrels to the ends of which axles have been fastened 
that rotate as the barrel is pulled along by a donkey or 
a mule. Fig. 45 shows a boy on his way to a water 
depot, and since he must travel down hill, and the barrel 
is without a brake, it is with great difficulty that he 
can prevent it from rolling on to the heels of the donkey, 
thus causing it to be broken to pieces by the kicking 
beast. He leads it skillfully from one side of the 
street to the other on an angie with the descent, and on 
the return not uncommonly the donkey is obliged both 
to pull the water barrel and to carry the boy. In Fig. 
46 we have the water wagons of the coastal mines 
coming out to the railroad for a water supply. The 
mines are twelve miles away, but every drop of water 
must be transported from the railroad, where tank cars 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 99 



convey wa- 
ter for long 
distances 
from wells 
or streams. 
Some of the 
coast towns 
have a hard 
time getting 
a water sup- 
ply. For 
many years 
they were 
supplied by 
boats from 
distant 
points where 
water is 
abundant. 
Others used 
condensed 
sea water. 
Caldera and 
Antofagasta, 
are still part- 
ly supplied in 
this way. 

The Irri- 
gated Lands 
of Peru. The 
maps (Figs. 

47, 48, 49) 
show clearly 
the law that 




Irrigated lands 

Irrigable lands 

03 Desert "pampas 

Scale of Miles 



Fig. 47. The northern coast region of Peru. Here 

are the most extensive irrigated lands in Peru. 

If all the river water were turned upon the 

fields the irrigated land could be 

increased one half 



ioo SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




controls the distribution of farms and therefore of cities 
and ports in the coast desert of Chile and Peru. The 

black areas, 
representing 
the irrigated 
tracts, are 
regularly ar- 
ranged along 
the coast be- 
tween the 
mountains 
and the 
shore. Wher- 
ever a stream 
of any size 
comes down 
from the 
Cordillera, 
there men 
have settled 
on planta- 
tions and 
ranches. 
Every port 
in Peru is 
either at a 
valleymouth 
or connected 



Fig. 48. The central coast region of Peru. In the 

northern part of this region the mountains come 

down to the coast and the irrigated lands 

are near the valley mouths 

with a valley by rail. Though the total extent of the valley 
lands is not large — but ten per cent of the coast region— 
the people regard them as the most important part of their 
country for, excepting the mines, there are almost no 
other sources of wealth. The valleys (Figs. 50 and 51) 
have a large part of the agricultural wealth already 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP CHILE AND PERU 101 



developed in Peru; they contain all the large cities of 
the coast region and most of the population. 

Trade of. the Coast Valleys. So widely separated by 
useless desert tracts are the coastal valleys of Peru that 
land commerce has less importance than the trade carried 
on by sea. A 
few caravans 
journey from 
valley to val- 
ley, occasion- 
ally there is 
a traveler, 
often a pros- 
pector look- 
ing for min- 
eral wealth, 
but these 
total a very 
small num- 
ber yearly. 
The sea route 

is preferable Fig. 49. The southern coast region of Peru. Most 
to the trails °f irrigation is near the western foot of the 

mountains. Large, arid pampas, or flat 
for it is cool dune-covered lands, lie between the 

and much Andes and the Coast Ranges 

more speedy. Yet even by sea there is not a large 
traffic from valley to valley. Trade requires dissimilar 
products which people may exchange for their common 
benefit, and since almost all the valleys produce more 
or less cattle, sugar, cotton, rice, and vegetables, 
the trade among them is supplemented by a more 
important trade between all the valleys, as a group, 
and the United States, France, Italy, Germany, and 
England. These countries manufacture cloth, tools, 




102 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



machinery, canned goods, shoes, and other necessities, 
but all of them do not produce cotton, rice, and sugar in 




Fig. 50. 



View of an irrigated garden in the Loa valley at Santa Fe, 
northern Chile 



sufficient amounts for the uses of their people. So they 
exchange their manufactured wares for raw products to 
the satisfaction not only of themselves but of the people 
in the coastal valleys as well. 

Steamers and. sailing vessels leave the ports of .Europe 
and America, round Cape Horn or pass through the Strait 
of; Magellan, and thus reach the coast of Peru, a voyage 
more than eleven thousand miles long. The coastal 
valleys of Peru are also in touch with the world through 
the ocean carriers that stop at their mouths in passing 
between the great ports of Europe and western North 
America. German steamers of the Cosmos line go from 
Hamburg to Vancouver and Seattle by way of the Strait 
of Magellan, and return, trading at all the principal ports 
on the way, a voyage at least six months long. The 
routes of many steamers will be changed now that the 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 103 



Panama Canal is opened. Commerce between Peru and 
the rest of the world will be more easily carried on. 
Except Ecuador, no other country of South America will 
profit so much through the use of the canal. 

Fig. 41 shows a steamer which has just entered the 
port of Payta with rice from China. She belongs to a 
British firm but is manned by a Japanese crew and has 
been chartered by Japanese merchants for trade with 
South America. The people of Piura grow a great deal 
of rice, but it is of such excellent quality and sells at so 
high a price that it is exported to Chile and Europe and 
cheap rice is imported from China for the poorer classes. 

A Straw Boat on the Ocean. In the same view (Fig. 41) 
may be seen one of the curious boats which some of the 
people of the Peruvian coast employ for fishing or for 




Fig. 51. Dam in the Loa valley near Santa Fe, Chile. Large 

turbines have been installed and power is generated for 

running the nitrate " oficina" at Santa Fe 



104 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

making short voyages along the coast. It is made of 
bamboo logs lashed together and propelled by a sail 
fastened to a single mast. A rough board serves as a 
rudder or as a scull when the wind is unfavorable. 
Another kind of boat, still more curious, is made entirely 
of braided straw and is so light that the owner can carry 
it under his arm or on his back without the least trouble. 
When the Spaniards came to Peru in 1532 they found 
the Indians from the coast valleys sailing these queer 
craft in considerable numbers. Upon them they brought 
out vegetables and ornaments of gold, silver, and cloth 
to the Spanish caravels. In his light boat the fisherman 
puts out into the surf, watches the waves closely, paddles 
with all his might on the back of some unusually high 
wave, following it seaward, and soon is beyond the reach 
of the surf. Often he is submerged under a huge wave, 
but he is seldom overturned. When his craft becomes 
wet the fisherman draws it up on the hot sunny beach, 
where it soon dries out. 

Seaport and Capital City. The commercial life of 
Peru centers at the port of Callao, seven miles from 
Lima, the capital city. Here are gathered vessels from 
nearly every large country in the world. Lumber 
schooners from Washington and Oregon; merchantmen 
from China and Australia; coal vessels. from England 
and Wales; freight ships from France and Italy; German 
steamers with general merchandise, and American steamers 
from San Francisco and New York. The flags of nearly 
all nations are represented. A harbor is afforded in 
the lee of the San Lorenzo Islands, a half mile off shore. 
Besides its natural advantages Callao has many artificial 
features, a deepened waterway close inshore, and modern 
warehouses, docks, moles, and hoisting machinery. These 
facilities are, however, quite too few in number and the 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 105 

harbor nearly always contains vessels waiting their turn 
at the docks. 

Lima: the Mecca of Peruvians. In one of the remote 
valleys of the Andes a traveler once met a Peruvian who 
cared for his beasts and offered him shelter for the night. 
After supper they fell to talking of travel, whereupon the 
Peruvian remarked that all the trails of Peru lead ulti- 
mately to Lima, the largest and most important city in 
the country. Many of his neighbors had spoken of the 
hope that some day they might visit this wonderful city 
as he had done when he was still a young man and as he 
hoped to do again. Just then some ragged shepherds 
passed by the door of the hut, and seeing them he said, 
"Think of it, those poor people have never seen Lima!" 
Farther on, the traveler came to a lonely telegraph station 
kept by the only white man in the place. The polite man- 
ners and well-dressed appearance of the operator were in 
striking contrast with the drunken people about him. 
Asked if he was born in this wretched town, he drew 
himself up and in a manner quite indescribable on account 
of its extreme pride and dignity, he answered, "No; I am 
from Lima." 

Lima is indeed an interesting city, no less because of its 
long and romantic history than its beautiful plazas and 
cathedral, its clean streets, and the wonderful view from 
the hill of San Cristobal out over the red-tiled roofs, the 
surrounding gardens and their irrigating canals, the 
distant port of Callao, and the long, curving, desert coast 
(Fig. 52). In the cathedral are relics of great historic 
interest that take one back through centuries; while 
in the schools, and especially in the new School of Mines, 
are found the most modern machinery and bright young 
students. It seems very odd at first to pass from so 
modern a school as that in which modern mining methods 



106 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

are taught to a children's school where every one studies 
aloud and where it appears as if the most diligent students 
are those who make the most noise ! 

When we remember that the greater part of Peru is 
unsettled country because it is covered with forest, or 
because it is situated at too high an altitude, or is too 
rocky or dry, and that the towns are for the most part 
small and squalid (Fig. 54), it is easy to understand 
why Peruvians think so highly of Lima. Once he has 




Fig. 52. A general view near the city of Lima, Peru, from the top 

of San Cristobal, a hill back of the city. The broad white band 

on the right is the flood plain of the river Rimac 

known the life there every Peruvian dreams of Lima and 
longs to return to it. With its electric cars, its attractive 
restaurants, its well-kept shops and busy people, it is a 
modern city of great interest and well deserves its place 
in the affections of the Peruvians. 

As in all Spanish- American cities, the central plaza, 
an open square in the heart of the town, is a matter of 
great pride to the people, and is usually kept scrupulously 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 107 

clean and as beautiful as the resources of the town permit. 
Here the people congregate on evenings when the band 
plays, and promenade in great numbers. This is every- 
where a very important and to the visitor a most inter- 
esting social event. The plaza is also well lighted, as in 
every town of importance, and is flanked by public build- 
ings and churches, and the largest shops and hotels. It 
is a favorite meeting place for friends and an excellent 
observation place from which to view the frequent reli- 
gious processions and military and civic parades. 

The Highest Mountain Railway in the World. At 
Lima we become aware of the second great industrial 
interest of Peru. Next to agriculture in wealth-producing 
power is the mining industry. The mines of Peru are 
rich and numerous, and it is at Lima that the business 
of the mines centers. From here too are exported the 
products of Cerro de Pasco (Fig. 66), one of the richest 
and most famous mines in Peru. To reach these mines 
from Lima one passes over what is perhaps the most 
remarkable railroad in the world, the celebrated Oroya 
line. Its construction was one of the great engineering 
feats of the nineteenth century, and a journey over it is 
a novelty in railway travel. 

The train climbs slowly up the Rimac valley and from 
the cars one looks out over beautiful irrigated orchards, 
gardens-, and farms (Fig. 52). Soon the train enters the 
mountains, the grade steepens, the irrigated farms dis- 
appear, bare rock and mountain slope come into view. 
The mountains become more and more rugged; the 
train rumbles over bridges, roars through tunnels almost 
without number, climbs worm-like along steep mountain 
sides where one may look down thousands of feet into 
the adjacent valleys, and at last reaches an elevation of 
15,585 feet, the highest point on any railway in the 



108 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

world. Profound chasms and inaccessible mountain peaks 
succeed each other so rapidly in the view that it is with 
difficulty one realizes that man is able to conquer such a 
wilderness of rock. Its builder, Henry B. Meiggs, has 
been called the king of railway constructors, and a ride 
over the Oroya railway convinces one that he well deserves 
the title. 

The Mines of Cerro de Pasco. The Cerro de Pasco 
mines (Fig. 66) are owned and operated by Americans. 
Electric lights are installed throughout, -the machinery is 
the very latest and best, and skillful engineers are em- 
ployed. But were they not so rich it would be impossible 
to operate them. The high cost of transportation over 
a difficult road, the importation of machinery from 
distant countries, and the scarcity of workmen combine 
to make their operation expensive. To all these diffi- 
culties is added the effects of the high altitude upon the 
workmen. At this great elevation (14,280 feet) the 
atmosphere is so thin that at each breath one draws in 
only half as much air as at sea level. The effect is soroche, 
or mountain sickness; marked by headache, dizziness, 
and nausea. Some people become accustomed to it to 
a certain degree, and others cannot remain even for a 
week. But the metals found here in such abundance 
are desired in the world's shops and factories and, in 
spite of all these difficulties, men find it profitable to 
work the mines. Each year they produce large quanti- 
ties of copper and silver, besides smaller amounts of tin 
and gold. 

A Railway across Peru. The port of Mollendo south 
of Callao is second in importance in Peru, and is the 
terminus of the great railway that crosses the coastal 
desert (Fig. 53) and the Andes Mountains and con- 
nects La Paz, the capital of Bolivia, with the sea. Like 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU 109 

the Oroya railway, this line is a great piece of engineer- 
ing work. It crosses a belt of desert country, and when 




Fig. 53. White sand drifts in the desert of Atacama near Mollendo, 
southern Peru 

this part of it was being built all water and food had to 
be brought to the workmen and the animals ; it traverses 
a lofty and rugged line of volcanic peaks and a high 
plateau, reaching an'elevation of 14,666 feet at Crucero' 
Alto ; it connects at Puno and Guaqui, two ports on Lake' 
Titicaca, with steamers that sail the loftiest large lake; 
in the world; it follows a most difficult and tortuous' 
course and was constructed at the expense of many lives, ! 
for to the heat of the desert was added the cold and 
snow and mountain sickness of the highlands. 

For twenty years (1872-1892) the Southern Railway of 
Peru was the only railway outlet of Bolivian commerce. 
It is still one of the most important commercial routes 



no SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

in that country. Over it are shipped to Mollendo a good 
part of the tin, copper, and silver of the mines, the wool 
of the flocks of llamas and sheep, and rubber, cacao, and 
hides from the eastern forests and grass lands of Bolivia 
and Peru. It is by this route that machinery for the 
mines and railways, clothing of all sorts for both whites 
and Indians, candles for private houses as well as 
for Catholic cathedrals and churches, canned goods for 
travelers as well as for the city dwellers, lumber 
for houses, drugs, and other goods are conveyed to 
Bolivia and to the cities of southern Peru — Arequipa, 
Juliaca, Puno, Cuzco. 

A Quarrel over a Rich Desert. From Mollendo it is a 
short sail southward to Arica, the port of Tacna, in the 
northernmost province of Chile. Formerly Peru owned 
Tacna, but in the war of 1 8 79-1 883 between Chile and 
Peru the Peruvians were defeated, and since that time 
Chile has occupied it. The conquered territory was to 




Courtesy of W. D. 

Fig. 54. Home in western Peru, where it almost never rains 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF CHILE AND PERU in 

be returned to Peru after the lapse of some years on 
condition that a promised test vote by the inhabitants 
should show a majority of people in the region to be 
Peruvians. This has not been done. Chile has not kept 
her promise, and the result is constant friction between 
the two nations and every likelihood of another war. 

A traveler once landed at Mollendo, climbed the steep 
slope to the customhouse, and there found his way 
blocked by an angry crowd gathered around a wild-eyed 
speaker, who now read from a newspaper, now shouted 
curses and imprecations to his listeners. The traveler 
found he was telling about the cruel treatment some 
Peruvians had received at Iquique, Chile. A mob had 
stoned their houses and so frightened them that they had 
taken the first steamer for Peru. Each time the speaker 
stopped for breath the crowd shouted, "Long live Peru! " 
and "Down with Chile! " The dock laborers caught the 
excitement, and when the next Chilean steamer came 
into port they refused to unload her cargo, with the 
result that she sailed away to Valparaiso with freight 
that had been dispatched to Mollendo. 

The desert region that is the cause of all this trouble 
might seem, on account of its heat and aridity, to have 
no attraction for any nation, but a little study shows 
that it borders the great nitrate province of Tarapaca, 
once a part of Peru and a source of valuable nitrate of 
soda. As soon as the great beds of soda and borax 
were discovered each nation became eager to get the 
larger share of what was before thought to be waste 
land. Disputes over old treaties and badly marked 
boundaries arose, and finally a ruinous war was waged 
with the result that not only Tarapaca but also the bor- 
dering provinces of Tacna and Arica were lost by Peru. 

Just outside the southern edge of the town of Arica is 



H2 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




El Morro, a five-hundred-foot hill bordered by steep 
cliffs, a landmark for passing vessels (Fig. 55). Here 

was fought one of 
thebattlesof 1880, 
in which the Peru- 
vians were defeat- 
ed. When the 
commander of the 
Peruvian forces 
saw that the bat- 
tle was lost, he 
spurred his horse 
over the edge of 
the precipice and 
thus leaped to his 
death rather than 
fall into the hands 
of the Chileans. 
El Morro is often 
called the Peru- 
vian Waterloo of the war of 1 880. Upon its crest may still 
be seen signs of the fortifications once existing there, and 
one may pick up scraps of old muskets and guns and occa- 
sionally a rusty cartridge. Behind the hill are a number of 
graves bearing the names of those who fell fighting for 
the land and glory of Peru. 

The Steep Coast of Northern Chile. A voyage along 
the arid coast of northern Chile is full of interesting 
sights of cities and people and natural scenery. From 
Arica southward the coast rapidly becomes bolder and 
soon presents to the sea a steep face from one to three 
thousand feet high. The same steepness also con- 
tinues below sea level for many thousands of fathoms. 
For example, near the port of Taltal, Chile (Figs. 3 



Fig. 55. The famous hill near Arica, Chile, 

where was fought one of the great battles of 

the war of i8yg. A Peruvian general is 

said to have spurred his horse over the 

cliff into the sea when he saw that 

the battle was lost 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP PERU AND CHILE 113 



and 57) there is a descent of more than forty thousand 
feet in one hundred and seventy-five miles. This steep 
slope from lofty cliff to deep ocean abyss is charac- 
teristic of. almost the entire west coast of South 
America. It enables steamers to sail very close inshore, 
and from their decks one sees many miles of bold 
desert coast. Here a sand drift extends out to the 
very brink of a cliff, its particles blowing into the sea; 
there a steep shore crumbles beneath the constant 
attack of the waves; and wherever a stream waters 
a narrow band 
of country, a 
few huts may 
be seen. 

Soon, how- 
ever, we come 
to ports and 
towns, Pisagua, 
Iquique (Fig. 
60), Caleta 
Buena, Anto- 
fagasta (Fig. 
62), Tocopilla 
(Fig. 56), and 
Taltal, which 
are not depend- 
ent upon fertile 
valleys or upon 
interior oases 
(Fig. 58). In 
fact, all signs 
of water are 
absent (Fig. 
59). Here are 
8 




Fig. 56. A mountain railway back of the port 
of Tocopilla, Chile. The grades are very 
steep and three engines are often re- 
quired to haul even a short 
train of cars 



H4 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



no fertile gardens, no line of verdant trees, no life- 
giving canals, no signs of agriculture or even of graz- 
ing. Yet these are 
the busiest and largest 
ports of northern 
Chile. The cause of 
the peculiar conditions 
is found in the nit- 
rate and borax de- 
posits of the desert 
interior. In the beds 
of ancient and now 
vanished lakes are 
precious salts — nitrate 
and borax — that bring 
prosperity to an other- 
wise useless land (Fig. 

57). 

The Caliche Beds of 
the Desert. Nitrate 

and borax are not 
known to occur in such 
abundance anywhere 
else on the earth. The 
extremely dry climate 
of northern Chile pre- 
serves these minerals 
from destruction. If 
rain fell the salts would 
be quickly dissolved 
and washed into the 
sea or covered with 

mud and other impurities and thus buried or destroyed. 

The extreme aridity which makes the land so barren is 




Fig. 57. A map showing the nitrate 
fields and ports of Chile 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 115 

seen to have a certain value here, for if people cannot 
grow vegetables and cotton, and raise cattle, they can at 




Fig. 58. Oasis of Soncor, western border of the Maritime Cordillera, 

Chile. Here a small mountain stream terminates near 

the edge of the desert of Atacama 

least produce soda and borax. The soda occurs in the 
form of great beds from a few feet to twenty feet thick, 
and in many places they are miles in extent. The "raw" 
nitrate of soda is called caliche by the natives. Fig. 59 
represents one of these nitrate beds of northern Chile. 
The high temperature and the extreme aridity result 
in a cracked and very uneven surface such as one 
may see 'on the surface of a sun-dried mud-flat in July 
or August. During the day these warped and buckled 
salt-covered surfaces, called salars, are extremely hot 
and as trying to the eyes as snow. Animals as well as 
men suffer in crossing them by daylight, and night travel 
is therefore preferred. In one mile of travel upon a 
difficult salar a traveler once counted sixty shoes or frag- 
ments of shoes torn from the feet of passing mules. 
Beside the trail one may frequently see the bleached 
bones of some animal which has been overcome by heat 



n6 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



or thirst, and left to die in the desert. Nothing grows 
upon their parched surfaces; naked as bare rock, the 
salars are the dreaded spots of the desert. 

The Manufacture of Nitrate of Soda. The process 
by which nitrate of soda is refined for commerce is as 
simple as it is interesting. The raw caliche is so hard 
and resistant that it must be first broken up with dyna- 
mite exploded in small bored holes from one and a half 
to fifteen feet deep. The explosion sends up a puff 
of smoke and great masses of caliche. The broken 
fragments are piled into two- wheeled mule carts, in which 
they are conveyed to small box-like railway cars with a 
dumping device that is easily operated by a lever. As 
each car comes abreast of the stone crusher it is dumped 
and the blocks of caliche go rattling down into a hopper 
that feeds the rollers. The crushed caliche is transferred 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 59. Piles of raw nitrate or "caliche" ready for transportation 
to the nitrate works, northern Chile 



THE COASTAL DESERT OP PERU AND CHILE 117 

to vats, where it is boiled until the nitrate is dissolved. 
The water containing the dissolved nitrate is then drawn 




Fig. 60. The harbor of Iquique, Chile, the greatest nitrate port 

in the world. To this port come ships from almost every 

large country. They are mostly sailing ships 

that make slow time, for the nitrate 

does not require quick delivery 

off into huge, shallow drying pans. In the heat and dry 
wind and under the clear skies of the desert the water 
quickly evaporates, leaving a dazzling white, crystalline 
substance, the commercial nitrate of soda. With the 
water evaportated a dense mother liquor remains from 
which iodine is manufactured. 

After the drying out of the nitrate it is put into sacks, 
each weighing about two hundred pounds, and shipped by 
rail to the nearest port, whence waiting steamers convey 
it to distant countries. It is very much in demand in 
Europe as the basis of a fertilizer for worn-out gardens. 
It is also employed in the manufacture of gunpowder and 
many other kinds of chemical compounds. 

So unusual a commodity as nitrate is rarely shipped 
out of a South American country that uses but little 
itself, without paying an export duty or tax, the burden 
of which falls upon the consumer in foreign lands. On 



Ii8 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

each hundredweight of nitrate the government collects 
a tax of about twenty-five cents, and since many millions 
of hundredweight are shipped out of the country each 
year, the total income to the government amounts to the 
handsome sum of about thirty million dollars. This 
is a large part of the total revenue of Chile and is equal 
to a tax of ten dollars upon every man, woman, and child 
in the republic. With this revenue Chile supports her 
fine army and navy, builds public roads and edifices, 
makes surveys and maps of the national territory, and 
pays the- salaries of government officials. It relieves 
the people from a part of the expense of government but 
at the same time makes them careless about government 
money, which is often spent wastefully and even wrongly. 

People in a Desert without Food. One of the most 
remarkable things about the nitrate establishments is 
their complete dependence upon the outside world for 
everything except nitrate; even the drinking water is 
obtained from distant sources. They are set in the midst 
of so arid a desert that everything required for their 
operation must be brought in by sea or over difficult 
trails from the Argentine or from Bolivia. This is true 
not only of the machinery, the coal, lumber, structural 
steel, iron, and glass, but also of the men, mules, hay, 
grain, vegetables, flour, and meat. Nowhere else except 
in the driest and most forbidding desert could such a 
substance as nitrate be found; nowhere else could be 
found so difficult a place for building and maintaining 
great establishments like the nitrate manufactories. 

The nitrate oficina at Central Lagunas, southeast of 
Iquique, Chile, derives its fresh water from a pumping 
station at Pique, eighteen miles away. It secures a 
part of its vegetables from Pica, over fifty miles away. 
The officials are chiefly from England. The horses and 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 119 

mules, and the hay and grain they consume, are brought 
by steamer from southern Chile. The machinery, canned 
fruit, and tinned meat are principally from England and 
the United States. The workmen are from southern 
Chile and Peru. Lumber is brought in schooners from 
Oregon, Washington, and Australia. 

The number of men employed at a given establishment 
is from three or four hundred to a thousand. They live 
in houses arranged in regular order about a central plaza 
or a long street of bare sand. The houses are commonly 
made of corrugated sheet iron and many are without 
floors or windows. This is, in a way, an advantage 
on account of the great heat, but it does not always 
induce the owners to be as clean as they ought to be. 
Their village life is rather dull; a few games, among 
which are football and cricket, are sometimes played, but 
usually the great heat and the complete absence of 
streams, grass, and cool forest or park, forbid all but the 
necessary exertions. 

The Great Nitrate Ports. The great nitrate exporting 
ports, Iquique, Pisagua, and Antofagasta (Fig. 62), and a 
half dozen lesser ports as well, have a far more interesting 
social and business life than have the nitrate villages. 
Iquique, for example, has a population of fifty thousand, 
maintains three beautiful plazas, has several good clubs 
frequented by Englishmen and Americans, and has 
stores and shops where one may buy practically every- 
thing that can be bought in the ordinary stores of this 
country. Its water front presents a very busy scene 
(Figs.. 60 and 61), for Iquique is the greatest nitrate port 
in the world. The flags of many nations are represented 
by the twenty to thirty boats one may always see riding 
at anchor in the outer harbor. The ships are of every 
variety — three- to five-masted schooners, steamers of 



120 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



every size, a few full-rigged ships, and smaller craft in 
considerable numbers. The inner harbor is full of 





Fig. 6i. The fleet of ships from many countries at the port of 
Iquique, Chile, loading nitrate of soda 

rowboats owned by men who meet the large steamers 
for passengers and baggage and assist travelers from 
hotel or steamer. As in all the other coast ports of 
South America, they crowd about the incoming steamers 
in great numbers, jostling each other and shouting and 
gesticulating in the most violent manner. When they 
have secured a passenger they hurry up the gangway, 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 121 

leaving their less fortunate companions to continue the 
crowding and the shouting. The scene is a novel one 
to the stranger, who, if he does not understand the 
language, is rather bewildered than assisted by the 
many loud offers of the willing boatmen. At most 
ports the number of boats is increased by fruit venders, 
who bring out vegetables and fruits of many kinds for 
the passengers. 

Iquique is like the interior nitrate villages in being 
almost wholly without means for securing food except 
by boat and to a very trifling extent by rail. Vege- 
tables are brought in from Pica, forty miles away, and 
water from Matilla through a pipe line thirty-five miles 
long. Everything else must be shipped from outside 
ports. Until the pipe line to Matilla was completed 
even the drinking water had to be brought in by sea 
and peddled in carts from door to door. Now it is 
provided by the city, to the great comfort and relief of 
alii especially the poorer people. 

So completely is the city of Iquique shut in by the 
desert, and so dependent is it upon the outside world for 
supplies, that in time of war it is easily conquered by sea. 
The enemy has only to control the sea to control the food 
supply, and by shutting off this supply bring the people 
to terms. Furthermore, there are no natural means of 
defense for any of these cities; their shore fronts are 
exposed, and there is no fertile back country from which 
men and supplies may be drawn. In 1880 in the war 
between Chile and Peru, and again in 1890 during the 
revolution in Chile, the city was taken by sea with scarcely 
any trouble whatever. So well aware is Peru that the 
sea is the great highway of -movement against her old 
enemy, Chile, that her statesmen frequently remark that 
for every cruiser Chile builds Peru should build two. 



122 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

A war between these two nations will always be largely 
if not wholly decided by a navy. 

Railways that Run up Steep Bluffs. There are many 
peculiar difficulties which the towns of this steep coast 
must meet on account of their position at the foot of 
a bluff several thousand feet high. At Caleta Buena 
four railways make a three-thousand-foot descent to 
the shore (Fig. 3). Cables are attached to the cars 
and engines pull them up or lower them at will. The 
situation seems a dangerous one for a railway, but it is 
doubtful if more accidents happen here than on ordinary 
lines. The machinery is all of very good workmanship 
and careful watch is kept of every part. The system is 
not unlike that used for making the ascent of Mt. Tom, 
Massachusetts, or Pikes Peak in Colorado. Never- 
theless, one feels a certain aversion to a trip on such a 
railway and few passengers enjoy what seems to be so 
perilous a ride. 

At Pisagua and Antofagasta (Fig. 62), as well as- at 
Tocopilla, the descent to the shore is made in ravines, 
that have been cut deep in the bluff, and the railway 
winds in and out in the most tortuous and irregular 
manner. For miles there is scarcely more than a few 
hundred yards of straight track in a single stretch. The 
grade is so steep it requires several hours to make the 
ascent with two engines and a short train. 

Earthquakes. The picturesque town of Pisagua, Chile, 
is typical of the peculiar position of all these coast 
towns on a narrow terrace at the foot of a cliff. The 
terraces are due to the planing action of the sea when 
the land stood somewhat lower than at present. After 
uplift occurred the formerly submerged shelf became a 
terrace. Such an uplift may mean the slipping of two 
blocks of the earth's crust in such a way as to cause a 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 123 



shock or jar which makes the ground tremble. The 
total amount of the slipping or faulting that has taken 
place on the west coast of South America is very great 
and is in part the cause of the remarkably steep coast. 
The earthquakes that occur as a consequence of such 
slipping of blocks of the earth's crust are very frequent 
indeed. No one has counted them all, but it is safe to 
say that scarcely a week passes without a jar heavy 
enough to be felt. Fortunately few of them are dangerous. 
At irregular intervals a violent earthquake visits the 




Fig. 62. Unloading merchandise at Antofagasta, Chile. As there 

are no good natural harbors along this shore, the ocean steamers 

anchor some distance from the coast and unload their 

cargos into small boats called lighters that are 

rowed to the short wharves 



124 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

region, sometimes with terrible effects. The solid earth 
seems to have become even more restless than the sea. 
To the rumble of the quake is added the crash of falling 
buildings and the screams of the terrified people. Fire 
may break out and add to the horror of the calamity; 
and an earthquake wave may come in from the sea, 
sweep over the low exposed terrace on which a city 
stands, and complete the work of destruction. 

In a moment a city may thus be partly destroyed, as 
was Valparaiso in 1907, Iquique in i860, and Arica in 
1877. In the ruined zone the charred and blackened 
facades of the buildings faintly outline the cluttered 
streets. Disorder prevails among the terrified people; the 
food supply is destroyed, and there is want and misery. 
Only after the lapse of months can the business of the 
city proceed as usual. Small wonder that after these 
dismal effects are once witnessed the slightest rumble 
startles the inhabitants and a heavy jar drives many 
of the people into the streets and fields with prayers 
and lamentations, fearful lest the walls of their houses 
fall and bury them beneath the ruins. 

Some Oases of Tarapaca. An excellent view of one 
of the larger oases of Tarapaca (Matilla) is shown in 
Fig. 63. One of the smaller kind, east of Iquique, is 
called the oasis of Monte la Solidad, or "Mount of Soli- 
tude." It well deserves the name. A single family of 
three have their home here, and secure a living from a 
small flock of goats, a few vegetables, beans from an 
algarrobo tree, and water from a well near by. They 
also own a few mules, some sheep, and a dog. The 
house is made of bark and twigs and a few pieces of 
lumber. It is twenty-five miles from their rough home 
to the nearest neighbors. A more isolated spot could 
hardly be found. 




Plate V. Mean January temperature 




Plate VI. Mean July temperature 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 125 

Since the life of each oasis depends upon a water supply, 
every inhabitant is concerned about the storage and use 
of water. If the village dam breaks or high floods sweep 
down the valley and overwhelm the ditches and gardens, 
the condition of the people becomes very sad. Supplies 
must come over long and difficult trails. The poor can- 
not buy what they have no money to pay for. Small 
wonder that water and streams are objects of reverence 
to the Indian dweller of the oasis. Although he has 
been taught the forms of a new religion (Catholic), he 
thinks of the old meanings, and the getting of food is 
still his chief object in life. His prayers are pathetically 
simple: he asks for full rivers and bountiful harvests 
that his daily bread may not fail. 

In some of the oases the ordinary water supply is not 
sufficient for the needs of the farmers. Deep holes or 
pits are then dug, on whose floors vegetables and grains 
are grown, which are not only shaded most of the day 
but also reach the ground water and thus use moisture 
that would otherwise go to waste. One may even see 
trees growing in the bottoms of the larger pits. The 
digging of these great holes requires a vast amount of 
hard labor, but the desert farmer must have water, 
and if it will not come to him he must go to it. This is 
a common practice in deserts. In Egypt and Algeria it 
is well known and has been followed for centuries. It 
represents an interesting phase of man's efforts to make 
"the desert . . . rejoice and blossom like the rose." 

Each town has its patron saint, supposed to guard 
some special interest of the place. For instance, Saint 
Andrew is the patron saint of Pica, where excellent wine 
is produced. San Isidro is the patron saint of the farmers 
at Canchones. Sometimes the patron saint of one village 
is taken to visit that of another village to ask alms. Then 



126 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



the wax figure of the visiting saint is carried at the head 
of a procession which marches across the desert to the next 
village, where it is met and welcomed. The united 

processions, 
marching to 
the sound of 
fife and drum., 
enter the 
church and 
close the rites 
with solemn 
prayers and 
chants. 

From the 
desert the ap- 
pearance of an 
oasis town after 
the heat and 
fatigue of a 
long, dusty ride 
is distinctly 
inviting. The 
neat squares 
of the vegetable 
gardens, the rows of refreshing orchard trees bordering the 
canals, the. life-giving stream, and the clustering houses 
of the villages combine to make an unusual picture. 

Upon some hilltop near each desert town a light is 
usually kept burning. Without it the traveler would 
find night travel difficult, since so many of the trails are 
half buried by drifting sand. The oasis of Matilla, 
a cluster of houses and palm trees, is shown in Fig. 63 
with its tower light on the extreme left. The white 
band in the middle distance is a trail fifteen miles 




Fig. 63. The prosperous oasis of Matilla, desert 

of Tarapacd, Chile. The white band in the 

background to the right is the desert 

trail. The tower light at the left is 

for the traveler who crosses the 

desert at night 



THE COASTAL DESERT OF PERU AND CHILE 127 

away. In the extreme background are the coast ranges. 

Where the People Pray for Rain. The southern end 
of the west-coast desert is visited by an occasional rain- 
storm in the winter or spring. Like the desert of southern 
California, its rainfall depends entirely upon the season, 
no rain falling during the summer and only a few showers 
during the spring. These showers increase in number 
southward, until finally, within the belt of the westerly 
winds, rains occur every two or three days and a certain 
amount of vegetation is found. The people eagerly 
watch for showers and in the springtime ask every desert 
traveler from the south if he has heard of rain. If he 
reports that rain has fallen in some valley near the south- 
ern end of the desert the people farther north are hopeful. 
They, too, may be lucky enough to have a shower. 

Besides the inconstant rains, which cannot be depended 
upon for a regular water supply, the inhabitants make 
use of the streams fed by rains and melting snows in 
the mountains. The extent of the winter snowfall in the 
mountains determines the amount of water the people 
will have for irrigation during the following summer (Fig. 
58). Hence they watch the mountain snow with great 
interest. If it comes far down the mountain sides and 
whitens them below the usual level there is the greatest 
rejoicing, for the abundant snows of winter mean rich 
harvests in summer. If the snows are light the people 
are discouraged. There will be little water for irrigation, 
the gardens and fields will suffer, and many of the people 
pray for rain. But when the snows are too heavy, or 
melt too rapidly, great floods come down the mountain 
gorges. These spread out over the fields an infertile 
deposit of coarse gravel and tear up dams and ditches. 
Sometimes the damage from flood is as great as that 
from drought. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA 
AND PERU 

The Switzerland of South America. The Indians of 
the lofty table-land of Bolivia live on farms far higher 
than those of any other large group of people in the 
world. For this reason Bolivia is sometimes called the 
"Switzerland of South America," but it would be more 
nearly correct to call Switzerland the Bolivia of Europe, 
for the elevations at which people live in Switzerland are 
far below those of Bolivia. Among the Alps the farms 
are in few cases above six thousand feet; in Bolivia almost 
all of them are above that height, and most of them are be- 
tween seven and twelve thousand feet. Indeed, one finds 
many farms at elevations well above thirteen thousand 
feet, while the stone huts of mountain shepherds have 
been found at seventeen thousand one hundred feet, or just 
below the snow line, the highest habitations in the world. 

These facts are well shown in the two maps, Fig. 64 
and Fig. 65; Fig. 64 represents the elevations of Bolivia. 
It shows that the southwestern third of the country con- 
tains all the high land while the northeastern two thirds 
are almost wholly tropical plains. Now in most countries 
the greater part of the people live on flat, fertile plains; 
they avoid the mountains. But in Bolivia there are 
almost no people on the plains, and in some places there 
is a dense population in the mountains. This is because 
the climate of the highlands is cool and that of the plains 
is hot, and, further, because the mineral wealth of the 
country is in the highlands (Fig. 66). If people wish 
silver, copper, and tin, they must go up into the mountains 
for them and to places at such great elevations that life 
is decidedly uncomfortable because of the cold and the 

128 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 129 




Fig. 64. A relief map of Bolivia 

mountain sickness. Thus the province of Frias, in the de- 
partment of Potosi, has nearly forty people to each square 
mile, although the elevation of the principal city, Potosi 
(Fig. 67), is more than thirteen thousand feet, decidedly 
too great for comfortable living. 
9 



130 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




Fig. 65. A map showing the density of population in 
Bolivia 

In the Nevados de Araca southeast of La Paz are mines 
nearly seventeen thousand feet above sea level where the 
cold is intense, the ground often covered with snow, and 
where a frost occurs nearly every night. The strongest 
engineers cannot work long at this great elevation, and 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OP BOLIVIA AND PERU 131 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 66. A silver mine that enriched the Spanish centuries ago, 
Cerro de Pasco, Peru 

after a few months they are obliged to go to lower places 
and rest. The workmen are Indians who are accustomed 



132 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



to live at elevations from ten thousand to fifteen thousand 
feet, yet even they suffer from the effects of the rarefied 



fl 


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i i t%|i 




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*mfM 


Jfi9| MHf^ ^*" ■"- 


r^'l^^ti^L^^liP*^^ j - ~ *** 


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^Jpjlmil^ Ui^jigjjjjj flrflBt fit nniflHMII 


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Fig. 67. Potosi, Bolivia, one of the loftiest large towns in the world 

air, and it is often with difficulty that enough laborers 
can be secured to operate the highest mines. The Indians 
lessen the disagreeable sensations of mountain sickness 
by the incessant use of the coca leaf, from which cocaine 
is manufactured. The leaf is chewed, after being mixed 
with ashes, and the effect is to enable the Indian "to get 
along for a time with less food, to endure mountain sick- 
ness or to avoid it, and to so numb his senses that he 
does not feel the cold. 

The Lofty Cities of Bolivia. The mines, the climate, 
and the trade routes combine to hold the population of 
Bolivia to the highlands. The extent to which this high- 
land population has grown as compared with that of 
the plains may be seen from the map (Fig. 65) . Within the 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 133 

cross-lined area there is a population density of twenty 
or more to the square mile. This cross-lined area may 
be seen, by reference to Fig. 64, to lie entirely in the 
highlands. The blank white area of the eastern plains 
has a population density less than one to the square 
mile. These facts may be stated in a slightly different 
way by saying that eighty per cent of the people (high- 
land dwellers) live upon fifteen per cent of the area and 
twenty per cent of the people (lowland dwellers) live 
upon eighty-five per cent of the area. One may also 
gain a clear idea of the great heights at which the people 
of Bolivia dwell by noting that among the one hundred 
and fifty-one important cities and towns four are above 
14,000 feet elevation, twenty-six above 13,000 feet, 
seventy-three above 12,000 feet, and seventy-seven, or 
more than half, are above 11,000 feet. The highest 
town of all is Aullagas, which is at the incredibly lofty 
elevation of 15,700 feet above the sea. 

The Irrigated Gardens. The highland dweller of 
Bolivia who depends upon the soil for a living must learn 
the art of using water like his brother on the arid west 
coast in the desert of Atacama, for large parts of the 
table-land of Bolivia, while not so dry as the coast desert, 
are dry enough to require irrigation. From hundreds of 
mountain brooks and rivers the people turn water out 
over their fields and in many places transform the land 
into gardens. 

About Cochabamba and in the fertile Cliza valley 
near by there are miles upon miles of green fields and 
gardens which stand out in sharp contrast to the brown 
and yellow desert about them. The same features may 
be seen along the edge of the plateau south of Oruro. 
Every mountain and plateau stream has been carefully 
directed out upon the fields of rich alluvium that border 



134 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the edge of the plateau. Here one may see within short 
distances of each other all the kinds of life found in the 
country. In the background of the photograph (Fig. 68) 
may be seen the desert mountains with rich tin and silver 
mines; at the foot of the mountains are the valleys, and 
upon their sides are the irrigated farms of the people who 
till the soil for a living, while out beyond the reach of the 
life-giving streams is the desert, where may be found only 
a few dry plants and the scattered huts of the shepherds 
with their flocks of llamas and sheep (Figs. 7* and 76). 
The Terraced Alluvial Fans of the Plateau. The care 




Fig. 68. A terraced alluvial fan in the great Bolivian plateau, 

near Cochabamba. Note the thick walls and the thatched roofs 

of the houses 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 135 

and industry of the highland farmer are well shown in 
the terraced fields that one may see in many parts of this 




Fig. 69. 



Looking across the terraced slopes at Huaynacotas 
in the Cotahuasi valley 



roof of the western world. The terraces are well shown 
in Fig. 69, which shows hillsides near Cotahuasi, Peru. 
Similar terraces may be seen in hundreds if not thousands 
of places throughout highland Bolivia and Peru. They 
may always be found where water and good soil are 
found together but where the slope is so steep that the 
water would furrow it and cut the fields to pieces if 
terraces with flat tops were not made. 

The running water of the irrigation ditches is not 
always used merely for the crops. If there is enough for 
the fields and to spare, a mill is built, and the water turns 
a wheel for grinding the barley, corn, and wheat. If 



136 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

there is plenty of good soil in one place and not much 
water, more terraces may be built than can be supplied 
with water. It may happen in this case that near by is a 
stream running to waste because there is no land that 
can be tilled. Then the clever farmer constructs a long 
irrigation ditch which turns this way and that along the 
valley; in some places the stream that flows through it 
furnishes power to a mill wheel, or slips through a tunnel 
cut in the solid rock, or runs smoothly in a viaduct built 
over a stone arch. The labor required to build all these 
works is great, but water in the desert is also very valuable. 
The deep, rich soil and the hot sun produce abundant crops 
if only enough water is supplied, and the desert farmer 
who terraces his fields and brings his water over long and 
difficult routes is always richly repaid for his work. 

A Plateau without Trees. The farmers of Bolivia in 
general live together in small villages and go out from 
them to till their farms and gardens, though one may see 
many an isolated hut far from any village. The appear- 
ance of one of these villages is well shown in Fig. 70, 
a photograph taken in western Bolivia — a cluster of the 
most curious houses, with walls of hardened mud, floors 
of earth, and benches of stone. But little wood is used 
in the houses or even for furniture because it is very 
scarce on the arid plateau and must be brought over 
such long distances and at such great expense that poor 
people can afford only the smallest amounts. Even an 
ordinary ox whip with a plain wooden handle costs more 
than the well-braided lash of cowhide, cattle being numer- 
ous on parts of the plateau but wood a luxury. In the 
forested Juntas valley of eastern Bolivia (Fig. 123) one may 
see Indians bringing cedar planks on their backs to Cocha- 
bamba, more than a week's journey on foot over a steep 
and difficult trail. The cedar is brought in for making 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 137 

tables, chairs, and benches for the townspeople. In 
some of the houses one sees many curious things used 




Fig. 70. A mountain village in the eastern Andes of Bolivia 

in place of wood, Reeds, bamboo, cornstalks, and even 
sugar cane are sometimes built into the roofs and walls. 
In some places a giant cactus is cut down and its hard 
interior split into a kind of wood used in place of boards 
for the door frames and thresholds of the houses. 

On the roof of the highland dweller's hut there is 
commonly a thick covering of grass or straw. The thick- 
ness of the roof covering is less to keep out the rain than 
the cold, for the rains are few in number and rarely heavy, 
while everywhere the night temperature is keen and the 
winter cold intense, especially in the higher villages. 
To keep out the cold the houses of the plateau vil- 
lagers of Bolivia are commonly without windows. The 



138 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

door is the only way by which light may enter, and 
the interiors are generally gloomy and dirty. When 




Fig. 71. A scene in western Bolivia. The white band is a plain of 

salt. About it are hill slopes covered with a thin sprinkling 

of grass and bushes. The place is about 13,000 feet 

above the sea 

cooking is done the smoke is allowed to escape as best it 
can through the open door. As a result the walls and 
roof are blackened and the whole interior filled with 
smoke. Even fowls are sometimes kept in the houses 
and roost in the sleeping rooms of their owners. 

When a plateau Indian wishes to build a house he stirs 
up mud and water as if he were about to make a huge mud 
pie. Then he adds straw or grass, tramping the whole 
with his bare feet until it is thoroughly mixed. The wind 
and the sun are then allowed to dry the mud, which is 
first put into molds. The great blocks of dried mud are 
used like stone or brick in building the walls of a house. 

The plateau has little wood. So when an Indian 
needs rafters for the roof or frames for the door of his 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 139 



house, he goes in search of cactus like the cordon of 
Fig. 72. From a dead trunk he strips off the spiny outer 
layer and exposes a thick, porous, and hollow inner layer 
which is easily split into any desired shape. If cacti 
cannot be found, he must carry wood for long distances 
from the eastern forests. 

The Highland Shepherd. Ranged on all sides of the 
plateau villages are the corrals in which are kept at night 
the flocks of llamas, alpacas, and sheep that graze upon 
the mountain pastures. Their owners drive them out 
during the day and travel all over the higher mountain 
valleys in search of 
food. In the most 
bleak and lofty 
situations isolated 
corrals are built for 
those shepherds who 
take their flocks out 
for days at a time or 
for the caravans of 
llamas that engage in 
trade from place to 
place, carrying flour, 
wood, millet, barley, 
salt, and wool. As the 
shepherd drives his 
sheep or llamas along 
he clucks and whistles 
and with a sling of 
twisted wool throws 
stones at them to keep 
them going in the 
right direction. 
While wandering with 




■■'" ;: %/, 



7-- 



>. 



Fig. 72. Tree cactus from which 
, wood is obtained by the moun- 
tain Indians 



140 SOUTH AMERICA:. A GEOGRAPHY READER 

his flock he generally carries a bunch of wool on his 
arm or at his waist, and spends his spare time indus- 
triously spinning the wool into yarn for the thick blankets, 
cap, stockings, and coat that he must wear to keep out 
the cold (Fig. 77). It is a lonely life that the shepherd 
leads, often without shelter except the corner of some 
corral, without good food for days, and far from any 
village. But his flock is to him a great necessity. With- 
out it he would have neither meat nor clothing for his 
family (Fig. 76). 

The Camel of the Plateau. The llama, the almost uni- 
versal beast of burden among the plateau Indians, is a 
peculiar animal. It is half camel, half sheep, in its 
general appearance. Its short body, cloven hoof, and 
stubby tail are very like those of the sheep, but it has 
long legs, a long neck, and a head like that of the camel. 
It is especially like the camel in its patient ways, stupid 
stare, and ludicrous face. When one rides through a 
flock of llamas some become curious and walk up and stare 
into one's face in a very funny way. If an attempt is 
made to drive them off they spit in a half scornful man- 
ner, and with a very dignified air walk solemnly away. 
Many llamas that are driven in caravans are scrawny 
and mean looking, but those that are kept for their 
wool and meat and pastured in the watered oases have 
much beauty of color and grace of carriage. In the 
shops of the large towns are small models of llamas made 
of silver wire, and a llama is figured on the Bolivian coat 
of arms and stamped on the silver coins (Fig. 73). 

Food is rarely carried for the llama even across the 
desert wastes. The poor animal must hunt its own food, 
and this while it is carrying a burden and traveling over 
a hard trail. But its owner drives it along very slowly, 
usually not more than fifteen miles a day, and thus allows 




HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 141 

it to wander from bush to bush and pick a living on the 
way. Neither is it loaded with too great a burden. 
Although it will carry seventy-five pounds day after day 
if it can secure a good supply of food, it is seldom obliged 
to carry more than fifty pounds. The llama is an awk- 
ward animal to control, for it is al- 
ways getting off the trail, and will not 
heed an ordinary call, though it answers 
to the whistle of the Indian driver. 

Fig. 74 shows a caravan of llamas 
just starting from a railway with flour 
that has been shipped from Oregon 

by steamer and several hundred miles FlG ; 73 ' ^ Bolivian 

J ten-cent piece 

across the desert of Atacama, the west- 
ern Andes, and the great central plateau of Bolivia. Now 
it is starting from Challapata on a caravan trip across the 
eastern Andes to the mountain basin in which lies Sucre, 
one of the four largest cities in the country. 

Moving a Piano on Muleback. Think of the expense 
of securing supplies for a great city in this roundabout 
way! The country is without manufactures and must 
buy its cloth, shoes, machinery, and even its pianos from 
either Europe or the United States. Think of moving 
a piano to Sucre! Yet this is done. The great box in 
which it is carried is fastened to four mules, two in front 
and two behind, and away goes the procession of drivers 
and beasts — sometimes across lofty mountains — with a 
piano that has already journeyed from four to twelve 
thousand miles by sea and land. Every night the mules 
are relieved of their load; every morning it is strapped 
to their backs again. In this laborious way it is at last 
delivered at an expense which only the wealthiest can 
afford. A piano in Sucre costs more than twice as much 
as a piano in the United States. 



142 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The Wild Vicuna and Guanaco. Closely related to 
the llamas are the alpacas, the vicunas, and the guanacos 
of the plateau region of Bolivia and Peru. The alpaca 
is a domesticated animal and is found chiefly in south- 
ern and central Peru and western Bolivia. In general 
appearance it resembles the llama, though it has shorter 
legs and both legs and body are covered with wool. It 
is never used as a beast of burden but is kept in flocks 
that spend their time in grazing. Its flesh is used for 
food, but its chief service to its Indian owner is its fleece, 
which, if pure white, is especially valuable for both rugs 
and clothing. Alpaca wool is very fine and thick, and 
is highly prized. 

The Indians hunt the wild vicuna and guanaco with 
dogs and powerful rifles, for one cannot get near these fleet 




Fig. 74. Llama caravan al Challapata, Bolivia, about to start 

with a load of Oregon flour for Sucre, over a week's journey 

to the east 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 143 



beasts without a favorable wind and under cover of a 
screen of brush. The hunters sometimes stalk the vicuna, 
a method that requires 
great skill and crafti- 
ness, for it is one of the 
wariest game animals 
known. At the slight- 
est sound it scents the 
air and with keen eyes 
searches every spot for 
an enemy. At the first 
sign of danger it is up 
and away at great speed 
to escape in some deep 
ravine or on the sum- 
mit of a lofty ridge. 
In Bolivia these animals 
live in the loftiest 
valleys among the 
mountains during the 
summer, but in winter 
they come down to the 
lower pastures that are 
free from snow. 

A Declining Tribe of 




Fig. 7 = 



Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Moving day in La Paz, Bolivia 



Fishermen. Besides 
the vicuna, guanaco, 
a species of deer, and the vizcacha, a small rodent, 
there are few game animals in all this great plateau 
region. In fact, they are so few that the Indians as 
a whole have apparently never lived in the purely 
hunting stage. They are farmers who depend chiefly 
upon the soil and not upon the chase for a living. In 
the whole region there is but one hunting and fishing tribe. 



144 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Fig. 78 shows a fisherman on Lake Titicaca, a member 
of the tribe called Uros, now much smaller in numbers 
than formerly. They live mostly in the reed swamps 
of the Desaguadero River, the outlet of Lake Titicaca, 
and fish on floating rafts of reeds and brush. They also 
tend flocks and cultivate small farms on the shores 
of the lake and thus earn their living in several ways. 
Their boats are made of straw and are fitted with light 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 76. Washing and drying wool from the A ndean table-lands 
for foreign trade, Arequipa, Peru 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 145 

bamboo masts and straw sails. Since the straw becomes 
water-soaked after a time, the boat must every once 




Fig. 77. Blanket weaving among plateau Indians 

in a while be drawn up on the land and dried out. 
The Steamers of Lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca, on 
which many of these curious craft are found, has the 
distinction of being the loftiest large lake in the world. 
Its surface is nearly two and a half miles above the level 
of the sea. It is one hundred and forty miles from end 
to end and about sixty miles wide. Although the water 
is not salty it is of rather poor quality. Lake Titicaca 
discharges through the Desaguadero ("the Outlet") 
River, which in turn empties into Lake Poopo, a very 
bitter salt lake one hundred and fifty miles to the south. 
In spite of its great height above the sea, Lake Titicaca. 
is one of the valuable lakes of the world. At its western 
end is the port of Puno (Fig. 79) ; at its eastern end is 
Guaqui. These are the two lake terminals for the rail- 
way from the seacoast to La Paz, the capital of Bolivia, 
and between them ply a line of steamers. The boats 
were made in Scotland at one of the great shipbuilding 

10 



146 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

yards of Glasgow and shipped to Lake Titicaca in pieces. 
After a long ocean voyage and a journey by rail from 
the coast, the pieces were put together at Puno to make 
a steamer. , 

Nearly all the supplies of northern Bolivia are now 
brought over Lake Titicaca to La Paz. The material 
for the new railway between La Paz and Oruro was also 
brought over the lake. We may therefore say that a 
railway was carried across Lake Titicaca by steamer. 
The ties and telegraph poles were brought from Oregon 
and Washington, the steel rails were shipped from 
Pittsburgh, and the engines were manufactured in 
Philadelphia. 

The White Salt Plains. South of Lakes Titicaca and 
Poopo are the great salt plains of the high plateau of 
Bolivia. Into them drain streams from a large area, the 
great interior basin of the central Andes. During the wet 



.; 






'?} v * 






/.,;• 


:\V\ : 




1 • ' ■ >\ 




"""'"'' - "' . .-,:.'.' ■ * -■ :■ ■ ^ 



Fig. 78. Uros Indian making a reed canoe on the border of the great 

reed swamp of the Desaguadero, twelve miles south of Lake 

Titicaca. The rope with which he is binding the reed 

bundle is made of grass. Note the cattle far out 

in the swamp in the background 



• HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 147 

season they are partially covered with water and are 
then all but impassable. In the dry season they may be 




Fig. 79. Port of Puno, western end of Lake Titicaca. It was here 

that the first steamer on the lake was built after being carried 

in pieces on the backs of mules and burros over the 

western Andes 

crossed by any one of a dozen different trails. Their white 
dazzling surfaces stretch out for scores of miles as a per- 
fectly smooth plain, reflecting the sunlight from thousands 
of salt crystals. Standing upon the western margin of 
the plain at sunrise and looking across it toward the east 
one gains a most impressive and beautiful view. From 
the plain a certain amount of salt is obtained that is 
shipped in small cakes to many parts of Bolivia; but its 
wide expanses are difficult to cross and its great wastes 
furnish neither pasture nor wood for man's use. 

The traveler across these salt plains about the borders 
of the lakes must pick his way with considerable care. 
In many places the surface consists merely of a crust of salt 
below which lies water ; or the alluvium about the borders 



148 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



(Fig. 80) is honeycombed by the vizcacha, an animal some- 
what like the prairie dog in its general habits. Upon these 
treacherous surfaces the mules and horses often find it 
extremely difficult to make headway without stumbling 
and throwing their riders to the ground. In the full glare 
of noonday the white surfaces are very trying to the eyes, 
and the many whirlwinds that sweep across the plains 
raise aloft great columns of dust, often to a height of 
hundreds of feet. 

The Shy Mountain Folk of Western Bolivia. The 
people upon the western border of the great salt plains 
of Bolivia are shut off from easy communication with 
the rest of the country. If they wish to reach the desert 
oases on the west they must cross the western Andes; if 
they wish to reach the people on the east they must cross 




Fig. 80. The basin of Lake Huasco, Maritime Andes, on the 

boundary between Chile and Bolivia. The dark band in the 

distance is the lake, and the white areas around it are 

the salt beds that are formed as the lake 

gradually dries up 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 149 

the salt plains, which are without water or food for man 
or beast. Until a few years ago white men had never 
been seen in some of their villages. When the first cara- 
van arrived the people were afraid, and ran and hid them- 
selves. Late in the afternoon when they returned they 
hid behind bushes and rocks and watched the strangers 
until sunset. In the dark they crept toward the tent, 
where a fire had been built, and at last one man ventured 
to speak. Then the strangers gave him money for the 
barley their mules had eaten and exchanged some of their 
biscuits for eggs and firewood, and asked many questions 
about the people and the country. These mountain 
folk regard a stranger with great suspicion and refuse to 
sell or give him anything. If he wishes a fowl or a 
sheep for food he must take it and afterwards pay the 
owner what he thinks is fair. If he asks for it he will 
be told that there is nothing. Since no minerals have 
been discovered in the surrounding mountains, and 
since the region is not on one of the great trade routes 
from the interior, these people have never been dis- 
turbed by white men and still lead the life their ancestors 
lived hundreds of years ago. 

A Cold Land in the Tropics. One of the most serious 
defects of the great highland region of Peru and Bolivia 
is the lack of timber or a proper substitute for it. It is 
disappointing to find so little fuel in a land so cold at 
night. The traveler who visits Cuzco or La Paz in June 
and July (the southern winter) may find the weather 
very cold indeed, the people wearing overcoats in the 
houses, Indians standing about shivering, and yet no 
fires in the houses, no stoves or furnaces, no means at 
all for warmth or comfort. The reason is not difficult 
to find. There is little coal in Bolivia — none has yet been 
mired in the country — and there is practically no wood 



150 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

within reach of the people of the plateau that can be used 
as fuel. Coal and refined oil, if used at all, must be 
brought from the United States, or coal may be imported 
from Wales or England, but at such expense that few 
people can afford them. Coal in the form of briquettes 
is brought in for the railway engines and for some of the 
engines of the mines, but it is exceedingly expensive. 
It costs at least four times as much as in England, or 
from fifteen to twenty dollars a ton. 

Cactus, Moss, and Dung for Fuel. In the absence of 
ordinary wood and with expensive coal and oil some rather 
curious kinds of fuel are employed. First of all are the 
dry and resinous tola bushes (Fig. So). These are pulled 
up roots and all, piled into bundles, loaded upon animals, 
and brought often for long distances into the principal 
towns. Donkeys and llamas bearing the tola brush are 
driven right into the kitchens of houses and hotels, where 
their loads are removed. The tola makes a very hot and 
lasting fire, but the odor of the burning brush is disa- 
greeably strong and fills the kitchen with blinding smoke 
and dirt. The traveler in the desert and the mountains 
often finds this bush his only means for making a fire. 
Sometimes the supply gives out in the country imme- 
diately about a mine or a town and then it must be 
gathered at greater and greater distances up to twenty 
or thirty miles. 

Instead of baking bread frequently in an oven as we 
do, many South Americans of the coastal region and 
the mountains bake it only once every week or two in 
an out-of-door oven, dome-shaped as in Fig. 81. The 
lower part is made of adobe bricks and the upper part 
of a mass of adobe rounded off to a smooth summit. 
Into this oven are piled brush and wood gathered from 
far and wide, and a great fire built, until the oven is 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 1 5 1 

thoroughly heated. When the fire has heated the oven 
it is raked out, the ashes are removed, and the loaves 




Fig. 8i. An out-of-door adobe oven for bread baking. These ovens are 
much like those built for domestic use by the early settlers in America 

are then put inside to bake. This is somewhat after the 
manner of the old-fashioned brick ovens of America, in 
use many years ago, except that the latter were generally 
built into the fireplaces. 

Poor as the tola is compared with coal and wood it is 
still the best substitute that the country affords and will 
long remain the principal fuel supply of the common 
people. When the railways to the eastern plains are 
completed some of the abundant wood of that section 
may be brought more cheaply to the plateau, where it will 
find a market in the principal towns. Even with these 
railways, however, the poorest people will still have to 
depend upon the cheaper sources of fuel. 

Another source of fuel for the people of Bolivia is 
unknown to us in this country — the moss that grows 
in lofty places in the mountains. It occurs in masses in 
some places three or four feet in diameter, and roughly 



152 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

resembles a huge mushroom. The fuel value of this 
moss is due to the amount of resin it contains, and as 
the amount of resin in it increases with the altitude, the 
Indians who make a business of gathering it often visit 
extremely high places. One may see them collecting 
moss up near the limit of the mountain snows, sixteen 
thousand to seventeen thousand feet above sea level. 
Great amounts of llama dung, called taquia, are also 
gathered from the corrals and sold for fuel, just as in 
Tibet the dung of the yak is widely used. When mixed 
with moss and a little coal it burns readily and yields 
an astonishingly large amount of heat. On our own 
western plains "buffalo chips" were for years a source 
of fuel. 

This combination of llama dung, moss, and tola brush 
is in many cases the only fuel employed at a mine far 
from the railway and the seacoast, a fact which empha- 
sizes the general lack of fuel in Bolivia and the degree to 
which it hinders the growth of the country. The absence 
of fuel would not be felt so much if the abundant water 
power were used. If dams were built in steep mountain 
streams, and turbines and dynamos installed, elec- 
tricity could easily be developed which would light 
Bolivia's cities and run her railway trains and do all the 
work of her shops. It will not be long before the people 
wake up to this fact and begin to use the water of the 
hundreds of mountain streams, many of which now run 
to waste. 

La Paz. Perhaps there is no greater surprise in all 
South America than that which greets the traveler who 
for the first time sees La Paz. In approaching the city 
the train runs over a dry, treeless, and lofty plateau 
that stretches away mile upon mile north and south. 
Toward the east and on the rim of the plateau is a 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 153 

magnificent line of snowy peaks. Suddenly, as if by 
magic, the whole world appears changed. One arrives at 
the brink of a vast amphitheater, with steep walls descend- 
ing over a thousand feet to the city of La Paz (Fig. 83). 
It is as if the city were in the bottom of a vast bowl 
and the traveler on the rim of it. In the bright sun- 
light and clear sparkling air of the lofty plateau, the 
red-tiled roofs of the houses, the spires of the cathedrals, 
the green open plazas, the deep blue sky, and the majestic 
mountains with their mantle of snow form a truly won- 
derful picture. 

The houses of La Paz are of stone or brick and adobe 
or sun-dried mud. The heavy walls are often unrelieved 
by decoration or ornament except the projecting iron 
work over the windows. The custom of barring the 
windows with iron is almost universal in South America 
as in Spain and Portugal, whence the greater part of the 
people came. In the days when the country was newer, 
the whites few in number, and life generally far less safe 
than now the custom was a very necessary one. Some of 
the houses and many of the shops and stores are painted 
in the gayest colors, bright blue rivaling that of- the 
clear sky, bright green like that of the freshest plants 
and trees of the plazas, and the purple, orange, and pink 
of the splendid sunsets of this interesting land. 

The fine central plaza of La Paz is ornamented with 
plants and shrubs, trees, flowers, and statues. The 
principal stores and hotels of the city flank it or are 
very near it, and here also we find the government 
buildings and the great cathedral of La Paz. The 
stone for the still unfinished cathedral is brought in 
part from the surrounding region but comes chiefly from 
a distance, and some of the stone used for veneer 
and ornament is brought by steamer from other countries 



154 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



and shipped by rail four hundred miles from the coast. 
The Markets of La Paz. The most interesting place 
in La Paz, if one cares most for the people of a city, is 
the great plaza in which the market is held and where all 
the Indian merchants of the town gather to buy and sell. 
Fig. 82 shows a portion of the market in. which fruit and 
vegetables are sold. It is crowded with women squatting 
beside their baskets and piles of fruit. They are dressed 




Fig. 82. 



Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

A market scene in La Paz, Bolivia 



in the bright red, blue, and yellow of which the Indians 
are so fond, and wear curious little straw hats and ample 
shawls and skirts. Some of them go barefoot even in 
the coldest weather, while others wear sandals. A few 
of the wealthiest and many of the cholos, or half-breeds, 
wear fancy imported high-heeled boots and colored laces 
of expensive material. They do not seem to be very 
eager to sell their goods, but wait quietly for a customer, 
bargaining with him in a lazy, half-hearted sort of way. 

The strange and abundant fruits and vegetables one 
sees in the markets of the plateau towns such as Cuzco, 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 1 5 5 

La Paz, Oruro, and Cochabamba are always a source 
of wonder to one who has just crossed the cold desert 
mountains and plateau. Whence come all these tropical 
fruits, the oranges, bananas, chirimoyas, the nuts, sugar 
cane, and peppers, and dozens of other things that suggest 
tropical lowlands rather than a dry and cold plateau? 
If one watches the caravans arriving and departing one 
may soon see that they come from the low valleys and 
plains east of La Paz. 

Going down the beautiful La Paz valley only a few 
miles one comes to a region very different from that 
about the city, and at still lower elevations is a land of 
well- watered gardens and fields, fine orchards, and a 
prosperous and contented people. The reason for all 
this lies in the more abundant rains of the lower valley. 
The lower the land the warmer it becomes, and the 
climate of the eastern valleys and plains is therefore 
spring-like and "pleasant, not cold and disagreeable as 
on the lofty plateau. Every day', year in and year out, 
caravans are going up and down the La Paz valley, 
some carrying food from the gardens and fields to the 
great city, others returning with merchandise of cloth, 
candles, shoes, hoes, and spades, and the dozens of little 
wares of the town. 

Some of the articles one finds in the markets of the 
plateau towns are of course produced on the plateau. 
Barley, meat, and wool are obtained from the flocks and 
fields of the plateau dweller. Here also are produced 
many varieties of potatoes that astonish the newcomer. 
In our country there may be many varieties of potatoes, 
but in the market they are all called potatoes. Not so in 
plateau Bolivia and Peru. Perhaps no one knows just 
how many kinds of potatoes here go under different names, 
but it is safe to say that there are at least a dozen. Many 



156 



SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



are grown in the ordinary way and are harvested and 
sold in their natural condition. A frozen and dried variety, 
known as chuna, is very light in weight and is much prized 
by the Indians, who use it in making many kinds of 
soups, but to the foreigner it seems rather tasteless. 

Besides the fruits and grains sold in all the plateau 
markets there are blankets made by the Indian women 
from the wool of sheep and llamas, ropes of llama wool, 
skins from the cattle of the' eastern basins and valleys, 
leather sandals worn by all the plateau Indians in place 
of shoes, ornaments of silver and tin, cloth from other 
countries, the bright-colored shawls so well liked by the 
Indian women, and many kinds of household utensils 
made of wood. 

The Royal Cordillera. Nothing else in Bolivia is so 
wonderful as the great mountain range east of La Paz 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 83. View of La Paz, Bolivia 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 157 

that may be seen from the streets of that city and for 
great distances out upon the plateau. It is called the 
Cordillera Real, or Royal Cordillera (also thought to 
mean real, or dominating, Cordillera, as distinguished 
from the lower ranges of the Andes), and right well it 
deserves the name (Fig. 84). It is the crowning range 
of all South America and one of the greatest scenic 
features of the world. Sorata on the north, Huayna 
Potosi in the middle, and Illimani on the south are the 
dominating peaks and reach altitudes from nineteen 
thousand to twenty-one thousand feet above the sea. 
Illimani is the highest of them all and overlooks La Paz. 
Its white, snow-crowned summit stands out boldly on 
clear days, but is never completely exposed to view for 
a long time. Clouds gather about it almost continually, 
and snowstorms and mists enshroud its lofty peak almost 
every day in the year (Plates II and VIII). 

For a long time Illimani was one of the unconquered 
mountains of the world. But in 1896 Sir Martin Conway, 
the great mountain climber, mapped the Cordillera Real 
and after several attempts scaled the lofty mountain. 
It was one of the greatest of the many achievements of 
this daring explorer, for Illimani is so high that to the 
natural difficulties of the ascent are added those due to 
the rarefied air and the incessant storms. For more than 
four thousand feet of the climb one is in the realm of 
cold, where blinding snow, slippery ice, and dangerous 
avalanches and precipices bewilder the explorer. 

A Day's Journey from Ice to Oranges. The great 
Cordillera Real of Bolivia is in many senses a dividing 
range. Westward stretches the flat plateau of Bolivia; 
eastward are the deep mountain valleys and the river 
plains. It is in this border region between mountains 
and plains that one finds such great contrasts of climate 



158 vSOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

and of products, the marvel of every traveler. Think 
of riding in a single day from a bleak, cold, and lofty 



Fig. 84. Looking east over the great high plateau of western 
Bolivia, the snow-capped Cordillera Real in the back- 
ground. A flock of llamas and alpacas is grazing 
in the middle distance 

range of mountains down through a region of eternal 
spring and camping at night in the hot mosquito-infested 
valleys on the edge of the Amazon lowland! That is 
what one may do near Sorata, and indeed in several places 
near the Cordillera Real (Fig. 84). 

Fig. 85 shows a group of Indians harvesting potatoes 
at an elevation twelve thousand feet above the sea. It 
is a dry, cold, bleak, treeless land. In one hour's ride 
from this point is a mountain pass where snow covers the 
ground and a piercing wind chills one to the bone. In 
three hours more one is in the bottom of a warm valley 
where sweet-scented flowers fill the air with perfume, and 
trees and vines grow luxuriantly. At nightfall one arrives 
at a camp site where oranges and bananas grow, where 
the air is hot and damp, dense tropical vegetation covers 
hill and valley with a mantle of green, and strange and 
beautifully colored insects and birds brighten and enliven 
the forest. 

In these steep valleys whose heads extend far into the 



HIGHLAND DWELLERS OF BOLIVIA AND PERU 159 



region of ice and snow and whose mouths are in the hot 
lands of the tropics one may find an astonishing variety 
of plants and animals. Up in the region of the snows 
only a few cacti and fungi grow, farther down grow the 
tola bushes, shrubs, and short grasses upon which the 
llama feeds, still farther down are the potato and barley 
fields of the plateau dweller, and then one gradually 
descends through the region of cornfields to that of coca 




Fig. 85. Indian villagers of the great Andean plateau harvesting 
potatoes at an elevatio?i of 12,500 feet above the sea. On 
the other side of the mountains in the picture are heavy 
rains and dense foliage; here the people must irri- 
gate their crops or plant them where the springs 
come out of the ground 



t6o SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

orchards, from coca orchards to orange groves, and at 
last to the land of the plains, the land of cacao and rubber. 

Plateau and Valley Contrasts. The habits and customs 
of the people of these different regions are as unlike as 
the products. In the higher portions of the land one finds 
thick-walled houses; in the lower valleys the climate is 
so warm that the houses have no walls at all. It is so 
dry on the plateau that while the roofs are made thick 
to keep out the cold they are pitched at a low angle; in 
the valleys the roofs are steep and thick not to keep out 
the cold but the better to shed water. On the plateau the 
people sleep in closed houses and under warm blankets; 
in the valleys they sleep in hammocks or on benches in 
open rooms. 

The plateau Indian rarely goes where his precious llama 
will not go, and the llama is a child of the cold, forestless 
plateau. If taken down into the warm valleys it will 
become sick, and if kept there long it will die. If the 
Indian of the plateau goes down into the valleys and 
plains he is not so comfortable as on the plateau, and if 
he stays on the plains he may quickly become ill and 
die. Thus the mountain climate and the valley and 
plains climate are so dissimilar that they have led to 
the development of two groups of people wholly unlike. 
In the past their differences often led to war, but in 
these days of multiplying trade routes they are glad 
to exchange their various products and live on friendly 
terms. 



CHAPTER VIII 
THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 

A Powerful Ancient Race. Upon the high plateaus of 
Peru and Bolivia one sees to-day a most interesting race 
of Indians. Their ancestors were subjects of that great 
Inca empire whose wise laws, deep religion, splendid 
palaces (Fig. 86), and fine aqueducts are among the 
wonders of the world. Even to-day the plateau Indian in 
his bright-colored blanket and cap, with his quick trot, 
his mysterious silence and grave looks, is an interesting 
creature. What must he have been in the days before 
the coming of the Spaniards? Now his spirit is broken 
by misuse and he is awed by the powerful white man 
whom he serves. In the days of the Inca empire he was 
a soldier in the army of the king, he fought and won 
great battles, made long, dangerous marches, and tamed 
even the grim mountain slopes for his flocks of llamas 
and the silver of his splendid temples. 

The Civilized Indians of the Plateau. The early 
Spanish explorers found to their surprise that parts of 
the New World were peopled by Indians who were not 
wild and savage, but partly civilized. In Peru, as well as 
in Mexico, there was found a great Indian nation, with 
laws, government, taxes, well-drilled armies, great forts 
and temples, and an elaborate religion. It is peculiar 
to both the Mexican Indians and those of Peru that 
their great civilization was developed upon a high table- 
land or plateau. We shall understand this fact if we 
remember that upon the wet lowlands in the tropics, 
where great heat is the rule, man finds progress all 
but impossible. The intense heat, as well as the dense 
11 161 



1 62 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

vegetation, prevents man from developing into the 
intelligent race type that is found in the cooler zones, 
in which France, England, the United States, Chile, 
and other progressive countries are located. 

There is one exception to this rule. Even in the tropics 
a cool climate may be found where there are mountains 
and plateaus. In fact, if one only goes high enough one 
may find mountain peaks with perpetual snow and ice 
upon them. Chimborazo at Quito rises twenty-one thou- 
sand feet above the sea. Its snow-capped summit may 
be seen on clear days from Guayaquil itself, one of the 
hottest cities in the world. The cold of high elevations 
even in tropical regions may be as intense as is the heat 
of the lowlands. Between these extremes, if only one will 
seek the right altitude, a moderate temperature may 




Fig. 86. A twelve-cornered stone in the Inca palace, Cuzco, Peru 



THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 163 

always be found, neither so hot as to prevent man's 
development nor so cold as to drive him away. This 
intermediate level is situated between seven thousand 
and twelve thousand feet. If the amount of land between 
those elevations in a given region is small, few people 
can occupy it, and there will not be offered a chance for 
growth; if the amount is large there will be room for spa- 
cious fields, wide pastures, great cities, and many people. 
In short, there will be room for a nation and a chance for 
civilization to develop. 

It requires but little study of the map (Fig. 64) to show 
how much of Peru and Bolivia lies at this favored height, 
where cool weather, clear skies, and water for irrigation 
may be found. It was very natural therefore that the 
Indians who dwelt there should be more progressive than 
their neighbors in the tropical jungles of the Amazon 
valley. They were more alert mentally. They built 
great cities and towns, among them Cuzco, the capital 
of the Inca empire (Fig. 87), and this the hunter in the 
forest never does. They lived by farming chiefly, with 
some grazing; hence there were more people in a given 
area than can be found in a forest where men hunt and 
fish over wide spaces for a living. Life in such a highland 
region may be easy, but never so easy as to make men 
lazy; it is hard, but never so hard as to discourage men 
and turn them into savages or prevent them from 
becoming anything more than savages. We must con- 
clude, then, that it is in large part the climate upon 
these highlands that resulted in the rise of the great 
empire of the Incas which stretched for hundreds of 
miles from Ecuador to Chile and from the eastern edge 
of the Andes Mountains to the Pacific coast. 

The Inca Kings at Work. The Inca Indians were 
remarkable in many ways but perhaps most of all for the 



1 64 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



way in which they adapted themselves to the country in 
which they lived. It is so dry upon the table-land where 




Fig. 87. The city of Cuzco, Peru, the ancient capital of the 
Inca empire 

they dwelt that, although some grass and potatoes will 
grow without irrigation, the best crops can be grown only 
where water is applied to the land. The Inca kings were 
very intelligent men and taught their people how best 
to conduct the water along canals to their fields of millet 
and corn. They taught them industry and skill. Every 
year the king himself went out into a field near Cuzco 
and guided the plow to show his subjects how necessary 
it was to work, and how important were the farms upon 
which the people had to depend for food. Of course, 
after that, no man felt ashamed to plow or to do other 
work in the fields, for the king himself, in sight of all the 
people of Cuzco, had plowed a furrow and worked with 



THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 



165 



his hands and soiled his feet with earth. This dignified 
labor. It made men want to do what the king had done. 
It made them proud of their work. 

The King's Agents. Another thing these kings did that 
was of great help to their people. They sent intelligent 
men through the land to find out for what products each 
part was best suited. If they found a spot where igno- 
rant people were growing potatoes and where corn would 
grow much better, they made them grow corn instead, and 
then exchange what they did not need for potatoes grown 
somewhere else. In this way they organized their subjects 
into a great family in which each group worked for the 
good of all the people. If the crops failed in one place on 
account of the lack of water, the people whose crops were 
good had to give up a part of their harvest to the poor. 



T 


T 


inMA 




, T -— ]| 




■_ s ^^"^J^-M jf^ 


•H* r '."l 


w ill 




V ^ T" Tp-Vf 





Fig. 88. A splendid church on the central plaza, Cuzco, Peru 



1 66 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Crops for Taxes. The kings also helped -trade. They 
urged the people of the mountains to visit the people of 
the valleys and plains and exchange the wool and meat 
of their flocks for the dried fruit and grain of the farms 
in the valleys. They were very careful in taxing the 
people to make them pay only what was fair and what 
they could easily get. Of course a government can be 
run only by taxing the people who are governed. This 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 89. Selling potatoes in their native landmarket before Jesuit 
Church and College, Cuzco, Peru 



THE IXCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 167 

tax supports an army, which is always needed for defense ; 
it pays the men who work for all the people ; it allows the 
building of forts for protection and temples for worship — 
an important thing in the religion of the Incas. The 
men who grew potatoes sent a part of their crop as tribute 
to Cuzco, those who kept flocks of llamas sent wool, 
those who grew corn sent corn. In this way the taxes 
were easily collected, for no man felt his tax a burden. 
The kings even taught their subjects to be clean in person 
and in their towns, and sometimes punished them for 
disobedience in regard to cleanliness. 

The Worship of the Sun. The different families of 
Indians in North and in South America had a great many 
kinds of religions. Each religion or belief had certain 
features that grew out of the kind of place in which it 
was known and practiced. Like all the other Indians 
the Incas had their own religion. They regarded it very 
highly and paid a great deal of attention to its rites. 
The great central object of worship was the sun, which 
was regarded as the source of all life, the giver of all 
benefits, the caretaker of the world. This is a very 
natural sort of belief to an ignorant Indian. 

On the night of June 2 1 , the shortest and often the cold- 
est day of the year in the southern hemisphere, many of 
the Indians of to-day still follow one of the old Inca 
customs. They build fires at every important street 
corner in the cities and towns and on every prominent 
hilltop and mountain in the country. They say that they 
do this to bring back the sun, which is then farthest north; 
and also to prevent the stones and earth from becoming 
so cold as to crack open from the frost. The custom is 
a pretty one, and the night is made extremely picturesque 
by the fires gleaming on all the hilltops roundabout. 
It reminds one of the games the Eskimos play and the 



1 68 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

sacred rites they observe to bring back the sun to their 
cold northern land. Small wonder, then, that the Incas 
worshiped the sun as the giver of light and warmth. Its 
light beautified the earth ; it gave life to the growing plants 
and warmth to man after the cold night. To one who 
has experienced the night temperatures on a high plateau 
it seems not at all strange that these Indians should regard 
the sun with awe, and should even build up a religion based 
on the worship of the sun. 

The Prayers of the Sun Worshipers. Many of the 
forms of the Inca Indian's religion are of great interest 
and even beauty. Some of their prayers are framed in 
very simple language and express deep faith that their 
petitions to the sun will be answered. Many of them 
have been written and preserved for us by an Inca Indian 
who lived in Peru at the time of the Spanish conquest. 
He was educated in Spain, and when he became old, 
wrote out in Spanish the history of his people. The book 
is now printed in English also, and is one of the most 
interesting stories in the world. Its author was Garcilasso 
de la Vega, to whom we owe much of our knowledge of 
Inca customs and beliefs. Some of the prayers he wrote 
are worth reading here: 

Prayer to the Creator 
"... Thou who givest life and strength to mankind . . . 
and vouchsafest that men live in health and peace, and free from 
danger: Thou who dwellest in the. heights of heaven, in the 
thunder, and in the storm clouds, hear us! and grant us eternal 
life. Have us in thy keeping, and receive this our offering, as it 
shall please thee, O Creator!" 

Prayer to the Sun 
"O Creator! Thou who gavest being to the Sun, and afterwards 
said let there be day and night, raise it and cause it to shine, and 
preserve that which thou hast created, that it may give light to 
men. Grant this, O Creator!" 

In their prayers one finds reverence for all the important 



THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 169 

things relating to daily life and common food. The Incas 
worshiped all mountain passes as places where, the 
hardest part of the journey ended, one might rest 
before beginning the descent. Even the Christian 
Indian to-day frequently worships at shrines built on 
mountain passes. The Inca Indian also worshiped the 
wind and running water. On this dry and cool plateau 
plants need besides soil two things in favorable amounts, 
water and sunlight. The precious water, led carefully 
out over the fields and gardens, was an object of great 
importance and therefore of worship. The lightning and 
the thunder were the voices of unseen spirits and were 
feared. So also, the Inca Indian feared to go up into the 
highest places of the mountains, for the mountain sick- 
ness which troubled him there made him believe that the 
lofty places were peopled by evil spirits which, being 
angry at man's intrusion, drove him out of their home 
with sickness and pain. 

Prescott's "Conquest of Peru." The boy or girl who 
has not read Prescott's Conquest of Peru has yet to enjoy 
one of the richest and most fascinating stories of history. 
In that work the great American historian tells in a simple 
way the story of the Inca life and religion. Prescott was 
especially impressed with the worship of the Incas and the 
temples they erected for that purpose. He described par- 
ticularly the Temple of the Sun in Cuzco, the capital of 
the Incas, where the kings dwelt and where all the people 
came once a year to attend a great feast in honor of the sun. 

Some Indian Palaces and Temples. The photographs 
(Figs. 86 and 91) give one an idea of the great walls in 
these temples and the great size of the stones in some of 
them. Fig. 90 shows the base of the Royal Palace. The 
stones are all well trimmed and fitted to make a wall which 
no one can fail to admire. 



170 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



In the view (Fig. 86) is shown the largest stone in the 
palace. Its height may be judged from the Indian who 
stands beside it. It has twelve angles or corners, and into 
each another stone is fitted with perfect nicety. So accu- 
rately have the different sides of each stone been trimmed 
that it is impossible in many places to insert the point of 
a needle between two faces in contact with each other. 
This is the more remarkable when we consider the tools 
with which these men worked. They were not acquainted 
with the use of steel but employed a chisel, ax, and 
hammer made of impure copper. Pure copper is soft and 
cannot in its natural state be used in making a cutting tool. 

But these Indians knew 
how to take impure cop- 
per and treat it so as to 
make a kind of bronze 
often wrongly described 
as "tempered copper." 
Another very remark- 
able thing about the old 
buildings of the Incas is 
the great size of many 
of the stones one finds 
in the walls. The pho- 
tograph (Fig. 91) shows 
Fig. 90. Donkey loaded with straw for one of the largest stones 
fuel on street in Cuzco, Peru The used in building the 
old wall to the left is part oj the ° 

building in which the Inca great fort (Sacsahua- 

kings once lived man ) (Fig. 92) that 

overlooks Cuzco from the summit of the hill on the 
northern edge of the town. This stone is about four- 
teen feet high and has been estimated to weigh a hun- 
dred tons. We should find such a stone exceedingly hard to 
move even with all the large hoisting machinery that we 




THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 



171 



can command. To the men of ancient Cuzco, who had 
no such machinery, the task must have been incredibly- 
difficult. 

* Even the streets of old Cuzco were paved by the indus- 
trious Incas. From the quarries about the city paving 
blocks were gathered 
and laid down in regu- 
lar fashion, just as we 
pave a city to-day. To 
supply the city with 
water a long aqueduct 
was built, several miles 
of it consisting of a tun- 
nel cut part of the way 
through solid rock. The 
fact that these old canals 
and tunnels still exist 
speaks well for the an- 
cient builders, who seem 
to have built as the 
Romans built, not for 
years but for centuries, 
not for men but for gods. 




Fig. 91. One of the huge stones in the 

walls of the old Inca fort (Sacsahua- 

man) near the city of Cuzco, 

Peru, the old capital of 

the Incas 



The Inca kings ordered roads to be built to the four 
parts of their empire. They were made very carefully, 
as was the rule in everything. In places they were cut 
in rock; in still other places they were graded and 
smoothed. Through the desert, where shifting sands 
make road building expensive and where the sand so 
quickly covers a roadway, they erected poles and piles of 
stones as signs of the way, signos del camino, as they are 
called in the Spanish to-day. The chief defect of these 
highways may be seen at stream crossings, where the 
traveler looks in vain for a bridge. Although the Incas 



172 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



were familiar with the keystone they never learned the 
secret of employing it in the making of a stone arch which 
might serve for a bridge. 

Upon the imperial highways the kings themselves 
journeyed to see the different parts of the empire and to 
become acquainted with the people so that they might 
rule more justly, somewhat in the spirit in which the 
President of the United States now travels about. The 



H^M^ >£ lis 


/• ..,;-; v 


0gf ' -^is)f*jpii 




VEBE&m * * ~~.j 




yMNf 


idK 



Fig. 92. 



Walls of the old fort at Cuzco, Peru, on the 
top of a hill near the town 



Inca king desired to let the people know that he was 
interested in the welfare of all kinds of men in all parts 
of the country, and he even went to the seat of war 
when it became necessary to encourage the armies to bet- 
ter fighting. 

The Inca Empire. Nearly all the Inca kings attempted 
to extend the boundaries of their empire by war and 
conquest. At the time of the coming of the Spaniards, 
about 1535, a vast extent of country was governed from 
Cuzco. The empire ran from Ecuador on the north to 
central Chile on the south, and from the Pacific shore to 
the very edge of the tropical plains east of the Andes. 



THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 173 

On the north the Spaniards found the Quitos, a race of 
Indians almost as remarkable for their great temples, 
their religion, and their intelligence as the Incas on the 
south. These fought with great courage and successfully 
resisted all attempts on the part of the Incas to conquer 
their country. Into central Chile the Inca kings sent 
some of their best armies for the conquest of the Arau- 
canians, a fierce and warlike people. But here again 
they met with a resistance so strong that they had to 
stop fighting and content themselves with the northern 
part of Chile, the arid region now known as Atacama. 

Although fine armies were sent eastward to conquer 
the Indians of the tropical forests and the plains, and 
though forts and roads were built in that direction for 
the same purpose, the Incas never were able to extend 
their empire very far eastward, not because the Indians 
<5f the plains fought better than the Inca armies but 
because the unhealthful country itself was their worst 
enemy. Malarial fever and many other tropical dis- 
eases as well broke out among the soldiers ; they could not 
withstand the stinging insects which are found in great 
numbers on the plains; the climate is exceedingly hot 
and the air so damp that the heat is felt much more 
than in a dry country; and the forest itself is marked by 
tangled undergrowth, trackless expanses, and dangerous 
animals. It is easy to see therefore that the Inca empire 
had its boundaries determined as much by the nature of 
the country as by the kind of people who resisted the 
armies of Cuzco. 

The Inca Religion. In those valleys in which the 
people fought against the Incas they did so chiefly because 
they did not like the Inca religion. The Incas demanded 
that all conquered peoples should worship the sun or be 
punished; but, said the people of the coastal valleys, 



174 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

even a fool could see that the sun was an object to be 
hated and feared, not to be worshiped and loved. For 
did it not wither their corn and dry up their fields and 
burn the earth? No, as for them, they were not going 
to accept a religion in which they had to worship the sun. 
Rather would they keep their old religion, in which they 
worshiped water and fish, the one because it gave life to 
the earth, the other because it supplied food to the people. 

The reason for this strong difference of opinion is easy 
to see. The Inca religion grew up on the plateau where 
it is so cool that the sun is desired and loved, while the 
people in the low coast valleys lived in a hot country 
where the sun's effects are often destructive to crops. At 
last the difficulty was overcome by a compromise. The 
people of the coast were allowed still to worship water and 
fish if they chose, but they must also build temples 
to the sun and worship in them. Thus there grew up 
along the coast a most curious mixture of Inca and Yunca 
religion, one part consisting of what the people wanted to 
believe and the other part of what they had to believe. 

It is a remarkable fact that many people eagerly 
accepted the Inca rule. This was due entirely to the fine 
systems of irrigation which the Incas always established 
in a conquered province and to the good and wise laws 
they always made. It was really better to belong to; 
the empire and to be protected and ruled by a wise 
king than to be continually at war with quarrelsome 
neighbors. There was also something splendid in the 
religion of the Incas. Its rites and ceremonies were 
grand and impressive, its prayers were about food and 
water and the sun, and all these things pleased people 
for whom life held few pleasures except the commonest, 
and to whom the chief concern was the getting of their 
daily bread, fairly wrung from a stubborn earth. 



THE INCA KINGS AND PEOPLE 175 

The Cruel Wrongs of the Spanish. With the arrival 
of the Spaniards in Peru there was brought about a 
complete change in the life and religion of the people 
within the empire of the Incas. The Spaniards easily 
took possession of Cuzco, for they had firearms while the 
Indians had only the simplest kinds of arms— stones and 
knives. The last king of the Incas, Atahualpa, was tried 
and cruelly put to death. Some of the temples were later 
torn down and the spaces between the stones searched 
for gold, the altars were despoiled of all their ornaments 
of gold and silver, the people robbed of their possessions, 
and other wrongs inflicted. Men and boys were com- 
pelled to work like slaves in the silver and gold mines in 
order that the inhuman thirst for wealth on the part of 
the Spaniards might be gratified. At last a better spirit 
came to rule among them. The Indians were given some 
rights: they were no longer compelled to work in the 
mines; property could not be stolen from them; they 
could no longer be abused and whipped. 

With all these changes came a change in the religion 
of the Indians. They no longer worshiped in the temples 
of their fathers. Priests from Spain established the 
Catholic religion and built great churches and cathedrals ; 
some of them, indeed, were built on the ruins of former 
temples (Figs. 88 and 89). In place of the rites and cere- 
monials of the Inca worship of the sun came the prayers, 
the processions, and the solemn music of the Christian 
religion as practiced by the Catholic Church. To-day 
the ancient religion is in many places no longer even a 
memory. If one steps into a cathedral in La Paz or 
Lima or Cochabamba, one finds within it many Indian 
worshipers whose god is no longer the sun, and who join 
in prayers not so much for rain and full streams as for the 
faith, hope, and love of the Christian religion. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE PLAINS AND INDIANS OF EL GRAN CHACO 

The Empty Spaces of the Gran Chaco. The mystery 
of that large blank space on the maps of the Argentine 
and of Bolivia that represents El Gran Chaco (Plate II) 
is realized by only a few people. There are tracts as large 
as the state of New York of which we know practically 
nothing; in others, white settlements are absent for 
hundreds of square miles; in still other places in the 
Gran Chaco live Indian . tribes of which little more than 
the name is known. Government enterprise, however, is. 
now opening up the best sections of the Chaco. The 
Argentine is spending large sums in an effort to colonize 
the region. Already some of its rivers have been explored 
and improved, and it is expected that two railway lines 
will soon be built through it. Improved means for 
trade will transform this land of mystery into a settled 
region, for its pastures and its soil are rich though its 
water supply is not everywhere good. Along the foot 
of the mountains, where water may be obtained from the 
streams before they have begun to fail, plantations of 
rice, sugar (Fig. 93), and cotton are already established 
as far as the railway affords a means for cheaper trans- 
portation (Fig. 94). Large tracts near the Paraguay 
have recently been purchased for cattle ranching. Amer- 
ican cowboys have been imported to care for the herds 
brought in from the south (Fig. 96). It will not be long 
before at least short railway lines will extend westward 
from the Paraguay and open up a vast cattle country 
(Fig. 95). The quebracho forests are another source of 
wealth in the southern part of the Chaco (Fig. 97). They 

176 



PLAINS AND INDIANS OF EL GRAN CHACO 177 

furnish a hard wood used for railway ties and fence posts, 
and from the wood a tannin extract is produced. Over 
ten million dollars' worth of quebracho wood and extract 
are exported each year. Half of this goes to the United 
States. The tannin is made in little factories on the edge 
of the Chaco and in the neighboring Argentine provinces 
of Santa Fe and Santiago del Estero. Large foreign 
companies have in the past few years begun production 
on a big scale. One company employs between four and 
five thousand men. 

The Rivers of the Gran Chaco. The Gran Chaco is 
so large that it is not contained in any one republic. It 
extends through Bolivia, Paraguay, and the Argentine,, 
where these meet in a common boundary at the northern 
end of the Argentine (Plate II). About the borders of 
this vast tract men have traveled for exploration and 
trade, have seen the Indians who inhabit the country, 
and along two lines have crossed it in some numbers on 
business. 

Since the rivers play so important a part in the develop- 
ment of a new country, it is worth while to see what the 
river systems of the Gran Chaco are like. The Paraguay 
is the chief river on the eastern border of the region, and 
has its sources far toward the north, well within the 
heart of the South American continent. It is so large as 
to be navigable two thousand miles above Buenos Aires 
to the port of Corumba, and smaller boats go even farther. 
It is therefore one of the routes of trade, the outlet for a 
vast region where rubber, cacao, and hides are produced. 
From the west it receives several tributaries almost as 
long as the main stream ; from the east no rivers of any size 
join the Paraguay. 

Among the rivers that join the Paraguay from the west 
the Bermejo and the Pilcomayo are the most important. 
12 



178 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The Pilcomayo is by far the longer but the Bermejo alone 
has been used for trade. The head of navigation on the 




Fig. 93. Sugar works at Ledesma, north-central Argentine, near 
the border of the Chaco country 

Bermejo is Oran, and thither canoes and flat-bottomed 
boats in considerable numbers formerly came from 
Buenos Aires, more than eighteen hundred miles away. 
The journey was extremely difficult owing to the shifting 
sand bars, the low water, the great heat, and the pest of 
insects. The expense involved in carrying goods by river 
boats was enormous, and only the remoteness of the prov- 
inces of Jujuy, Salta, and Tarija, and the length of other 
routes to them, made men take the Bermejo route. The 
government has recently deepened it so that it has a reg- 
ular steamboat service for some distance above its mouth. 
The Mysterious Pilcomayo River. The great neighbor 
of the Bermejo, the Pilcomayo, has long been one of 
the geographical conundrums of South America. Both 
its headwaters and its mouth have been known for 
many years, but the middle course of the river has re- 
mained almost unknown, on account of the swamps and the 
fierce Indians. Crevaux, the Stanley of South America, 
whose explorations have been among the most important 



PLAINS AND INDIANS OF EL GRAN CHACO 179 

of any made there, lost his life trying to discover the 
secrets of the great river. While making his way down 
the stream in 1882, he was treacherously killed by,Tobas 
Indians, who live in force along the middle course of the 
stream. Eleven other explorers in turn met defeat in 
attempting what Crevaux failed to do. In 1898 Ibaretta, 
the last of them, met the common fate. 

But one man has traveled from the headwaters of the 
river to its mouth. Thouar, a Frenchman, went from 
the upper Pilcomayo to Asuncion on the Paraguay. He 
and his men were obliged to eat their mules and dogs, 
and were found by hunters in a half-starving condition 
near the mouth of the great river. So difficult had been 
their journey that they had no energy left to look about 
them and see what the country was like, and but little 
was learned from them. Pages, a captain of the Argentine 
navy, tried to ascend the river, building a series of dams 
below his small steamer to secure navigable water, but 
he was obliged to abandon his vessel in the marshes and 
at last barely escaped with his life. 




Fig. 94. Iron pipe hauled on mule carts from the end of the railway 
in northern Argentine to the oil fields of south-central Bolivia 



180 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

In 1905 Gunnar Lange undertook to make a thorough 
study of the geography of the Pilcomayo, to see if the 




Fig. 95. Chaco cattle in the desert of Atacama, after a twelve days' 

journey across the Cordillera between Salta, Argentine, 

and San Pedro de Atacama, Chile 

river were at all navigable, and to discover its exact nature 
as a route of trade. The party under Lange consisted 
of thirty men. Beef animals and canned provisions in 
large quantities were sent ahead of the expedition to the 
swamp region of the lower Pilcomayo where the real work 
began. Lange crossed the salt swamps with their inter- 
lacing streams by using oxen to drag the boats. The 
expedition finally reached a point above the swamps 
seven hundred miles from the mouth of the river. So 
salty were the swamps that drinking water was obtained 
with the greatest difficulty. 

The expedition discovered that the banks of the stream 
for seven hundred miles are lined with dense forests of 
both hard and soft woods. On low mounds among the 
marshes and on higher ground away from the river are 



PLAINS AND INDIANS OF EL GRAN CHACO 181 

splendid pastures. Were a channel opened by dredging 
and the swamps drained it would be possible to turn vast 
tracts of the Pilcomayo valley into grazing land and pro- 
duce large numbers of cattle. At present cattle would 
have to be driven five hundred miles to the Paraguay 
through a country where pasturage is not always easy to 
secure, and where the water is stagnant and unfit to drink. 
The Road to Santa Cruz. There is a strip of country 
across the northern Gran Chaco that is now well known 
because of the fact that through it Santa Cruz de la Sierra, 
one of the larger cities of Bolivia, finds an outlet to the 
sea. The water supply o\^er this route is not good, and 
sometimes cats called "tigers" kill the oxen and increase 
the delay. By oxcart it takes from two to five months 



Fig. 96. Gauchos of the Chaco at Embarcacion, northern Argentine. 

The heavy cowhide flaps on the saddle front are a protection 

against the thorny shrubs through which the cowboy 

must ride in rounding up his stock for the 

long drive to the end of the railway 



1 82 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

to cross the Gran Chaco; and about two weeks if one is 
fortunate enough to get mules. If the road is very bad 




Fig. 97. Quebracho logs, northern Argentine 

goods cannot be moved at all. The oxcarts used here 
are great, lumbering, two-wheeled vehicles built very 
strong on account of the ruts, roots, swamps, and stream 
crossings without number. 

The Indians of the drier regions manage to sustain 
themselves by using water stored in the vertical leaves 
of the cactus and by squeezing out the juice of the large 
pulpy water-potatoes. Both travelers and natives suffer 
much from the mos^uitos and also from the barbs with 
which all the plants are armed. The most acceptable 
present to a Chaco Indian is a shirt, which is at once 
a cover at night and a partial shield from the thorns and 
saw grasses by day. 

The Trade of Santa Cruz. One wonders why in the 
face of these great difficulties people ever came to settle 



PLAINS AND INDIANS OF EL GRAN CHACO 183 

at Santa Cruz, one of the oldest towns in Bolivia and yet 
one of the most remote from the sea. It was founded 
by Catholic missionaries and for a long time was a center 
of religious teaching. Its full name signifies " Holy Cross 
of the Sierras." Its importance from the first was due to 
the manner in which the streams radiate from this locality, 
thus giving exploration parties the choice of several routes 
through the river plains of the upper Mamore. It early 
became the center of a cattle industry, for which the 
grassy plains about it are admirably fitted, and on account 
of its position near the mountains it has the very great 
advantage of a climate cooler than the plains towns 
enjoy. Since the rubber tree has become so important 
Santa Cruz has grown rapidly. Its position at the head- 
waters of the Mamore gives it an important part in 
the trade of that stream and its neighbors, — the Yapacani, 
Rio Grande, and others. Though most of the Bolivian 
rubber is sent down the Madeira and the Amazon to the 
Atlantic, a part of it is taken in canoes, batelaos, and 
oxcarts to Santa Cruz, where it pays the bills of the 
rubber men who have bought goods of the merchants of 
Santa Cruz. Thence these merchants ship it by oxcart 
to the Paraguay and river steamers deliver it to the docks 
of Buenos Aires. 

The Fierce Tobas Indians. Few Indian tribes of South 
America are really dangerous to whites, but of this 
number the wildest groups among the Tobas might well 
stand at the head of the list. The whole group numbers 
about twenty thousand and its members live principally 
along the middle Pilcomayo. A tribe of the Tobas 
living in the Argentine Chaco have a more peaceful 
character, some of them working for part of the year 
upon the sugar plantations of the whites; others living 
in the recesses of the forests and swamps manage to 



1 84 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

resist all attempts at conquest. Although one military 
expedition has been sent against them, they have never 
been reduced and are still one of the most serious diffi- 
culties to be overcome in the development of these remote 
grasslands. Early in 19 13 a half dozen whites near the 
lower Bermejo were killed by Tobas. They are typical 
red men, tall, muscular, bony, with long black hair. 
They are extremely wary and have few words either 
among themselves or for the stranger. 

"We saw four Indians come stealthily down to the bank 
armed with long lances. Then lying down among the 
reeds, they gazed silently into the water till they saw some 
big fish pass by, when, with wonderful skill, they speared 
them one after the other, and threw them on the bank. 
Next they lit a fire, roasted the fish they had caught, and 
devoured them. This done, they picked up their weapons 
and crept back into the woods as noiselessly and stealthily 
as they had come. The whole time — some three hours — 
not one of these men spoke a word ; they gave the neces- 
sary directions to each other by slight inclinations of the 
head only." (Knight.) 

In the simple and primitive life of most tribes of Chaco 
Indians the customs and habits closely reflect the geog- 
raphy of the region. When the cold south wind blows 
they take off their blankets and shake them, saying that 
they are shaking out the sickness, colds, and influenza 
which this wind always brings. They sprinkle the blood 
of a duck in order to make rain in their dry scrub country. 
When a rainstorm rises they wait until it has passed over- 
head; then they push with their hands and shout, "Away! 
Away ! ' ' On cloudy days an old man holds a firebrand up 
toward the sun that it may shine again. Kyaiya is the 
name of a feast which is held each year to welcome back 
the spring, with its balmy winds and green foliage. 



CHAPTER X 
PARAGUAY 

A Country that gives its Name to a Tea. It has been 
said by a traveler that if all the tea that grows in 
Paraguay were brewed at one time there would be 
more than enough to furnish a cupful to every man, 
woman, and child in the world. It is one of the chief 
products of Paraguay, and so much has been raised 
there and shipped to other countries that many call it 
Paraguay tea. In South America it is called mate. It 
grows in groves and even in forests of tea. Think of a 
land where tea is so abundant that there are hundreds' 
of square miles of it growing wild! In some places it 
covers all the mountain slopes in woods known as 
yerbales. At one time the Jesuit fathers cultivated it in 
plantations so as to improve its quality, but since their 
expulsion there has been no real system of cultivation 
and the trees grow wild. 

Paraguay tea makes a very cheap beverage and is said 
to have excellent effects without harming the nerves of 
the people who drink it. It is used in Brazil, where it is 
now grown for the market in greater quantities than in 
Paraguay; the gaucho of the Argentine pampas finds it 
an almost indispensable drink; and even the distant 
Tehuelche Indians of the Patagonian plains use it in con- 
siderable quantities. Perhaps at some time in the future 
its use will become much more general and we may find 
ourselves drinking tea from Paraguay and Brazil as well 
as from China and Japan. 

The Orange Groves of Paraguay. Scarcely less wonder- 
ful than the forests of Paraguay tea are the great orange 

185 



1 86 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

groves. Oranges are so plentiful there that they are fed 
to the pigs as the farmers of Illinois feed corn to their 
live stock. On the streets of some of the Paraguayan 
towns one may buy thirty oranges for a cent. Oranges 
are handled like potatoes or wheat in this country and not 
in the delicate way in which we handle them in the United 
States. If one orange is harmed there are a dozen to take 
its place ; and where thirty may be had for a cent who 
cares whether there is one orange more or less ? One finds 
oranges and orange groves everywhere: along the river 
banks, about the country and city houses, in parks, in the 
forest, on the hillsides; wild oranges, cultivated oranges; 
oranges so plentiful that they belong to any one who cares 
to pick them up. Their cost depends merely on the labor 
of gathering them, which amounts to almost nothing. 

Sometimes steamers come up the great rivers of Para- 
guay and take on a load of oranges to sell to the people 
of the Argentine or Uruguay; and then the river front 
presents a pretty sight. Great loads of golden oranges are 
carted to the river bank and women begin loading them 
into baskets in which they carry them on board the boat. 
Dozens and sometimes hundreds of women may be at 
work at one time taking the place of the machinery 
with which boats are generally loaded. 

A Country of Few Men. If we think of the size of 
Paraguay we call it next to the smallest country of South 
America; but if we think of the number of people in it 
we say that Paraguay is the smallest of all South American 
countries. There are fewer people in Paraguay than there 
are in Ecuador or even in Uruguay. But a more peculiar 
thing than the small number of people in Paraguay is the 
small number of men. A moment ago we read that women 
load the orange boats, and if we should travel in Paraguay 
we would at once be struck with the fact that women do 



PARAGUAY 1S7 

almost all the work of the country, whether it is easy 
or hard. Paraguay is essentially a country of women. 

It came about in this way. At one time Paraguay had 
a very despotic ruler who governed the people harshly and 
quarreled with his neighbors. Finally he got into serious 
trouble with Brazil, the Argentine, and Uruguay, and 
with all of them at the same time! So these countries 
banded together, collected their gunboats and armies, 
sailed up the Paraguay River, and then marched out over 
the country and drove the Paraguayan army from one 
place to another until it was entirely destroyed. So 
many men lost their lives during this war that when it 
was ended there were scarcely enough men in the country 
to do its business. Three fourths of the whole population 
had been destroyed or driven out, and when the war ended 
there were only about two hundred and fifty thousand 
people in the country. This war lasted from 1865 until 
1870. Since then the population has been steadily increas- 
ing and now numbers but little less than a million. 

Physical Features. The western portion of Paraguay 
consists for the most part of flat plains upon whose surface 
the water stands during the wet season (Plates I, VII, and 
IX) . Every year when the rivers are in flood the banks 
are washed away, the river overflows, and the region is 
covered with water for miles and miles. This makes the 
country very unhealthful and fevers, especially malaria, 
are common. Also, the farther north one goes the hotter 
it becomes and the more difficult it is for the white man 
to make his home. Southern Paraguay is cooler and its 
climate has been described as spring-like, but whether or 
not one calls it spring-like depends upon the spring one 
is accustomed to have at home (Plates V and VI). Per- 
haps it is spring-like to a Cuban or a Guatemalan, but to 
an American it seems decidedly tropical. Nowhere in 



i88 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Paraguay are there high mountains, but in the eastern 
part of the country there are mountains that rise two 
thousand or more feet, their tops covered with forest. 

But little is known of the interior of Paraguay except 
that in the remote parts of the country live Indian 
tribes that have scarcely ever seen a white man except the 
slave raiders who range the forest capturing the natives 
to work on the rubber plantations. Once in a while a 
white traveler makes an expedition into the northern 
country and after terrible hardships comes back to tell 
of the fever-ridden land where the climate is bad and 
where the few people are very much afraid of the whites. 

The River that gave its Name to the Country. Among 
the rivers of Paraguay we should learn first of all of the 
one for which the country is named. Running for the 
most part through a flat country, the Paraguay has no 
falls or rapids in its course ; it has, however, so many turns 
and curves that the distances from place to place some- 
times measure several times as far by river as in a direct 
line. Steamers go up the Paraguay to Corumba, Brazil, 
and very small steamers and launches even go up as far as 




Fig. 



Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Asuncion, capital and largest city of Paraguay 



PARAGUAY 189 

Cuyaba, where all direct connection with the outside 
world ends and where one plunges into the vast forested 
interior of South America. The course of the river is 
most uncertain and with every flood the pilots of the 
river boats must learn the channel all over again, for 
the curves and the sand banks change their position con- 
stantly. Slowly the railway is being pushed up the 
valley, but it will take some years to reach Corumba. 
Then it will be easy to travel into the very heart of 
Paraguay, and explorers and merchants will make known 
to us what the great interior spaces contain. 

The Great Falls of the Parana. The most interesting 
river in South America after the great Amazon is the 
Parana (Fig. 26), whose volume is greater than that of 
the Mississippi and whose basin contains falls that rival 
Niagara. The muddy flood of water that forms the 
Parana comes down through a great primeval wilderness 
of swamp and forest, and the borders of the stream are 
lined with dense tropical vegetation. In the main the 
lower course of the river is very flat and boats may easily 
sail against the current. From the deck of a river steamer 
one sees distant forest-covered mountain ranges with 
hazy blue summits and indistinct outlines. Beyond the 
end of the steamer journey one comes to the falls of the 
Parana, also called the "Seven Falls" because in time of 
low water the broad river is split up into a number of 
separate streams. Below the falls the river runs in a 
narrow gorge of great depth. Farther up, the Parana 
is joined by the Iguassu River. Six miles above the 
meeting place of these two streams is one of the most 
beautiful falls in the world, the falls of Iguassu, the Indian 
name for "Great River." The water rushes over a cliff 
of ancient lava more than two hundred feet high, and the 
roar of the falling waters may be heard for miles. 



rgo SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



The Life of the Paraguayan People. Paraguay is 
far from the sea and its people are so shut off from the 
rest of the world that we should scarcely expect them to 
live like the inhabitants of more fortunate places. The 
greater part of the people of Paraguay are Indians 

or mixed descend- 
ants of the Guar- 
ani stock. They 
live scattered 
throughout the 
western or low- 
land section of 
the country in 
little groups and 
villages. Each 
village consists 
of huts with 
thatched roofs and 
walls of mud or 
sticks and poles. 
The walls need 
not be thick, for 
it is never cold in 
Paraguay as it is 
in the northern 
part of the United 
States. The Par- 
aguayan babies play on the mud floors of the huts and 
out in the sunshine often without any clothing, and men 
and women wear only light cotton clothes. At night 
those who live in huts sleep in grass hammocks hung from 
the roof. To a large extent the people depend upon 
fruits for their food, and chief among these are oranges. 
Another common food is the manioc. It is a root with a 




Fig. 99. 



Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

A Paraguayan woman smoking 



PARAGUAY 191 

white mealy interior that tastes somewhat like a mixture 
of flour and potatoes. It is not so pleasing to the taste 
as our potato, but the people use it quite as much as the 
potato is used in America. 

It takes the traveler a long time to become accustomed 
to the general use of tobacco in Paraguay. Women, 
and even children and babies, learn to smoke (Fig. 99). 
It shocks one to see a pretty girl walking along the street 
puffing away at a big fat cigar as if her life depended upon 
it. Tobacco is one of the important products of the 
country. It is grown in great quantities and sold in the 
form of cigars or cigarettes or in great rolls of twisted 
leaves. It is very cheap, of rather poor quality, and some 
of it is almost worthless. 

Besides the picking of oranges and the gathering of 
mate or Paraguay tea the people of Paraguay herd cattle 
on grassy tracts near the river. Most of the cattle are 
slaughtered for use in Paraguay, but in small numbers 
they are also shipped in river steamers to the countries 
of the south, where they are killed and dressed for the 
frozen-meat market or used as fresh beef. 

The only large cities are Asuncion (Fig. 98), the capital, 
with ninety thousand people, Villa Rica with twenty-five 
thousand, Conception with fifteen thousand, and Villa del 
Pilar with ten thousand , and these are very small as most 
cities go. Indeed, except for Asuncion they are mere 
villages of very poor people. Even in the capital there 
are few well-kept houses or offices. The greater part of 
the city consists of thatched, mud-walled cabins. They 
have a squalid appearance relieved only by the smooth 
curve of the river bank and the wooded hillslopes over- 
looking the city. 



CHAPTER XI 

URUGUAY: THE SMALLEST COUNTRY IN 
SOUTH AMERICA 

The Sparse Population of South America. It is one of 

the odd features of some of the South American republics 
that they should have such a small number of people. 
Ecuador and Bolivia are alike in this respect, and even 
more conspicuous are the republics of Paraguay and 
Uruguay. In the United States the strong and continuous 
westward movement of settlers from the Atlantic coast 
made each new group feel that it sprang from a common 
stock, and even if the bond at times became weak, still 
there was a feeling of unity that has grown with the 
passing of time until to-day we are a solid nation of 
many millions even if we are spread rather thinly over a 
huge territory. 

Although the Spanish and the Portuguese of colonial 
times were very widely scattered throughout the south- 
ern continent they lived in large numbers only in the 
most favored localities. Now the* physical geography of 
South America is such that these favored localities are 
in general separated by stretches of territory of so little 
value, even at present, as in general to make good natural 
boundaries. The Argentine has the greatest extent of 
good agricultural land, but the Argentine people are 
separated from the Pacific coast by a barren mountain 
range, the Andes. The valleys of coastal Peru are 
exceedingly fertile, but they are separated from the 
equally fertile coast valleys of central Chile by one of the 
most barren deserts in the world. The mines of Bolivia 
were the centers round which the white settlements of 

192 



URUGUAY: THE SMALLEST COUNTRY 193 

that country first formed, but the mines of Bolivia are 
reached only after crossing wide expanses of upland and 
mountain country of little value to man. 

Even in colonial times interests came to differ partly 
because of the differences of climate, soil, and natural 
resources, and partly because time increased rather than 
diminished the original differences between the several 
groups of settlers, if such we may call the adventurers, 
gold seekers, and missionaries that first came to South 
America. When the wars of emancipation began each 
group was eager to break away from Spain and to form 
a republic. Had the different groups been nearer each 
other, or had they sprung from a common colonizing 
center, they would in all probability have formed a 
smaller number of republics; but separated and different 
as they were it was natural that each should want to 
become a separate nation, not daring to trust its destiny 
with a larger group that might neglect it. 

Among the smaller republics is Uruguay, with an area 
less than twice that of the state of New York. All the 
railway lines of Uruguay, if put end to end, would scarcely 
reach from St. Louis to Boston. The country has no 
navy, and the entire army numbers but five thousand men. 

A Country with Little Waste Land. But if Uruguay 
is small there is at least hardly any waste land in it. Not 
an acre is sterile on account of climate, for the summer 
heat and the winter cold, in even the lowest and the 
highest places, do not prevent man from occupying all 
these regions in all seasons. To be sure some of the land 
is marshy and some of it is rocky, but most of it is good 
land that may be cultivated almost the whole year 
through; and, finally, there is no mountain barrier that 
stands between the interior and the coast, as in Brazil; 
hence all the land is easily reached by the settler. 
13 



194 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

A large river, partly navigable, flows along the entire 
western boundary of Uruguay, drains the land, and is a 
highway to good markets. It also prevents that quar- 
reling with neighbors about boundary lines which might 
lead to war. Coal, iron, and gold are found in small 
quantities, but they will never become the basis of great 
industries. The lasting resources of the country are its 
grazing and agricultural lands. 

The Herds and Cowboys of the Ranches. While a 
large part of Uruguay could be used for raising grain 
only about one sixtieth is actually so used to-day. Almost 
the entire energy of the country people is spent in the 
raising of cattle and sheep. No other republic in South 
America is so exclusively devoted to the grazing industry 
as Uruguay; in none other is the proportion of cow- 
boys, or gauchos, so large. The land is all near the sea. 
Markets are therefore easy to reach at all times, and 
many are the herds that these favorable conditions 
have brought into existence. Dried-meat and frozen- 
meat plants are common; at Fray Bentos, Uruguay, is 
one of the largest meat-extract plants in the world, over 
four thousand beeves being killed daily. A million and 
three quarters of oxhides are exported every year and 
almost a hundred thousand bales of wool, besides horse- 
hides, hair, tallow, and other animal products in large 
quantities. 

It is one of the peculiar features of a grazing region 
that the towns are small and few in number. The people 
live so widely scattered that a large number of very small 
towns, rather than a small number of large towns, best 
serve the needs of the people. Until recently Uruguay 
illustrated this principle better than almost any other 
country. Among thirty-three inhabited places marked 
on the maps of less than half a century ago when grazing 



URUGUAY: THE SMALLEST COUNTRY 195 

was the sole important industry of Uruguay, only six 
were at a greater distance than thirty miles from the coast 
or from the Uruguay River. When the total number 
had increased to ninety-six the interior towns numbered 
thirty-seven, but of these by far the greater number were 
places of little importance and probably not more than a 
round dozen actually deserved the name of town. Hence 
on leaving the capital and chief city of the country, 
Montevideo (Fig. 100), one plunged suddenly from the 
highest civilization to the semibarbarism of the Middle 
Ages. The capital with its handsome plazas, boulevards, 
and theaters was suddenly exchanged for a grassy wilder- 
ness of rolling hills, without bridges, roads, fields, groves, or 
gardens, and scarcely even a town worthy of the name. 
And instead of the people of Montevideo, with their 
cultivated manners and modern dress, one found the 
gauchos, a race of cowboys, always armed, dressed in the 
rudest manner, and while on the whole less wild than 
their Argentine cousins they were not always as careful 
of the law or even of human life as the more law- 
abiding citizens wished them to be. 

But with the rapid growth of the grazing industry the 
land has become increasingly valuable and the ranges are 
not so large as they once were. Furthermore, numbers 
of Italian farmers have come into Uruguay recently; 
and farmers live in denser groups than ranchmen and 
cowboys, for they require less land for a living. Hence 
the number of towns (and especially of interior towns) has 
increased. Scattered all over the country, two, three, 
or more in each "departamento," are little towns con- 
taining from four to twenty thousand people. Some 
of the towns have modern improvements such as electric 
lights, running water, good parks, clean streets, and at- 
tractive clubs, and life in many of them is truly pleasant. 



1 96 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The advantages of Uruguay as a home for the farmer, 
no less than for the ranchman, are great indeed. In 
many new lands the settler must first cut down a forest 
and hew his home out of the wilderness before he can let 
in the sunlight, raise crops, and make a living. But in 
Uruguay there are no dense forests, only scattered clumps 
of trees which may be used for timber. Man need do 
nothing in the way of clearing the land, since cleared land 
is already provided for him by nature. On the grassy 
downs of this country he may pasture his flocks and herds 
without thought of shelter from the weather, and raise 
almost any kind of grain that grows. 

The Port of Montevideo. Three hundred thousand 
people, or about one third of the population of Uruguay, 
live on a little point of land between the Rio de la Plata 
and a small bay which has become the harbor of Monte- 
video (Fig. ioo). While there are several small ports at 
other places on the coast of the country none has attained 
much importance as compared with the capital city. 




Courtesy of W. D, Boyce 

Fig. ioo. Along the docks, Montevideo 



URUGUAY: THE SMALLEST COUNTRY 197 

Here are gathered most of the people of means and leisure 
and one third of the whole population of Uruguay, all the 
large buildings, and the shipping, and to this point the 
principal railways converge from the Uruguayan plains. 

Montevideo would be far more famous if it were not so 
near Buenos Aires on the opposite side of the La Plata 
estuary. Most of the general business for the interior 
goes to the Argentine capital. Montevideo was at first 
claimed by the Portuguese and later by Brazil, and has 
witnessed many campaigns; in fact, it has been called 
"New Troy" on account of the fact that it was once 
besieged for nearly ten years (1842-1851). While the 
harbor of Montevideo has been deepened to accommo- 
date large ships it is so exposed to the strong southwest 
winds of winter that expensive works have been necessary 
to provide adequate shelter. 

The Effect of the Wars. However favored a land may 
be by nature it cannot become an ideal place in which 
to live unless the people who settle in it are peaceful and 
law-abiding and put the good of the Country before preju- 
dice and quarreling. .Unfortunately, the history of Uru- 
guay is made up largely of a long record of political troubles 
that have stirred the country almost from the time that 
independence was gained. It is doubtful if the rule of 
old Spain would have done the country more harm than 
that independence which to so many has meant merely 
a chance to gratify personal ambition and obtain high- 
sounding titles or government offices with high salaries. 

Several causes lie back of the political unrest of Uruguay. 
The early fighting against the Indians had made the settlers 
warlike, frequent changes of government had made them 
accustomed to political uncertainties, and the presence 
of an army tempted every ruler to stay in office through 
the unlawful use of military power. Political trouble 



iqS SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

has been endless. "It began before the ink on the 
constitution was dry." The history of Uruguay since 
1828 has been a history of repeated revolutions, factional 
quarrels, and a spirit of nameless unrest; it is full 
of disgusting details of coarse politicians trying to get 
control of the public purse in the name of patriotism 
and making the spoils of office their chief object in life. 

Only within the past few years has a better political 
spirit been growing among the people. In 1903 the rival 
party to the government made its last serious effort to get 
control of national affairs, but the revolutionists were 
driven out, their leader, Aparicio Saravia, killed, and a 
degree of security given to the country which it has never 
before enjoyed in its long history. Respect for the law 
and the constitution is growing, the people are acquiring 
a broader and a better outlook on affairs, and with political 
peace the country will not be long in attracting industries 
which up to this time have been shy of such a troubled 
home. 

To all the internal troubles must be added those due 
to the position of Uruguay between Brazil and the Argen- 
tine. Its geographic position makes it another Belgium. 
Located between two powerful and over-shadowing 
neighbors, each greedy for its rich farming and grazing 
grounds, Uruguay was claimed and indeed, for short 
periods, governed by first one and then the other of its 
neighbors. But the very presence of two powerful 
neighbors instead of one has preserved the integrity of the 
country. Each in turn, wishing to prevent its rival from 
acquiring this land, became the partisan of Uruguay when 
the other became its enemy. In 1859 a treaty was signed 
between the Argentine and Brazil that prevented both 
from interfering with the independence of Uruguay when 
hostilities between the big rivals were in progress. 



CHAPTER XII 
BRAZIL: THE COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 



A Big Country with Varied Interests. Brazil has often 
been called the land of coffee, and indeed this is the chief 
product of the country (Fig. 101); but also within the 
borders of Brazil is the land of rubber — the Amazon 
Basin. Were one to visit the interior uplands of southern 
Brazil one would find there neither coffee nor rubber but 
great herds of cattle, horses, and mules grazing upon rich 
pastures. This section one would have to call the land of 
cattle. In a few districts the people are talking and 
thinking about neither coffee, nor rubber, nor even cattle, 
but minerals. They live in the land of mines. 

So great are all these industries and so many people are 
interested in them that it would hardly be fair to call 
Brazil by any one of these names : it is rather the land 
of many lands. Other countries also have a variety of 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. i oi. Picking coffee, Brazil. Typical plantation scene 
199 



200 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

interests and industries, but in no other country of South 
America is the variety so large. Bolivia has hundreds of 
men interested in rubber, but Brazil has thousands. For 
every herd of cattle that Colombia supports, Brazil has 
scores; for every cargo of coffee produced in Venezuela, 
Brazil produces dozens. Brazil is a land not only of 
many interests but also of big interests. 

One reason for these wide differences and for these 
great interests lies in the size of the country. It embraces 
half a continent, just as the United States occupies nearly 
half of North America. That is one reason why we have 
orange trees in Florida and spruce trees in Maine, glaciers 
in the mountains of Washington and deserts in Arizona, 
wheat fields in Dakota and cotton fields in Mississippi. 
We, too, live in a land of many interests, where people 
in large numbers are doing widely different things. We 
are the Brazil of North America, after a fashion, as 
Brazil may roughly be said to be the United States of 
South America. 

Including Indians, Brazil has more than twenty million 
people, or about as many as Spain, and more than a 
third as many as live in the United Kingdom. No 
state in the United States is so large as the territory of 
Amazonas at the western end of the Amazon Basin, which 
covers seven hundred and thirty-two thousand square 
miles, or almost three times the area of Texas. Amazonas 
is so large that if all of the 1,600,000,000 people of the 
world, men, women, and children, were gathered within 
its borders, and the land evenly divided among them, 
each one would have a square plot one hundred and 
fifteen feet on a side. If one started to walk about 
Brazil, and walked twenty miles each day, it would take 
eight hundred days, or several months more than two 
years, to complete the trip, for it is sixteen thousand miles 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 201 

along its borders, or more than halfway around the world. 
A country as large as Brazil has many interests because 
it extends into many climates, and each kind of climate 
has its own particular kind of products. From north to 
south Brazil is more than two thousand miles long; 
from east to west it is more than two thousand miles 
wide in its widest part. These figures mean that while 
one end of Brazil lies near the equator, the other end lies 
well within the edge of the temperate zone; that though 
some places are near the sea, others are so far away that 
to reach them requires weeks of travel by the fastest 
means in the country; that there is room for great moun- 
tain ranges which affect the temperature and rainfall; 
that there are mighty rivers, many Indian tribes, many 
kinds of animals, trees, shrubs, and insects. 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 102. Railroad bridge near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This railroad 
is one of the great pieces of engineering work in South A merica 



202 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The Little-known Xingu Valley. Far in the interior of 
South America and almost in the center of that continent 
is the valley of the Xingu, 1 a river which flows northward 
from the central region of Brazil. It is located in the 
least explored part of the country and has been visited 
by only a few explorers at long intervals. Here we 
find some of the lowest tribes of Brazil. It will help us 
understand how vast is the great interior of the country 
to look at the life of these remote people, still unaffected 
by the civilized whites of the coastal states. In 1884 a 
party of Germans made a somewhat careful study of the 
river and the people who dwell along it. This expedition 
found that the Xingu and its branches are inhabited by 
eighteen different Iridian tribes which number in all about 
two thousand people. The so-called ''tame" Bakairi, 
one of the Xingu tribes, resemble the farming population 
in other parts of Brazil in that they are engaged in 
agriculture and cattle raising. These people sell their 
produce to the traders from the towns, and have lost all 
connection with their savage brothers among the other 
Xingu tribes. 

The Yurunas have had a great deal of intercourse 
with the people of Brazil and as a result they are the 
most civilized of the Xingu tribes. Their commerce 
with the whites consists chiefly in the exchange of their 
strong canoes — hollowed from the single trunks of great 
trees — for tools and beads. Their small huts are built 
on little rocky islands in midstream, generally near a 
fall or a rapid. In this location they have a natural 
defense against their old and bitter enemies, the maraud- 
ing Carajas, who roam through the woods and along 
the streams of all the country between the two princi- 
pal rivers, the Xingu and the Tocantins. They are 

Pronounced sheN goo'. 




Plate VII. Mean January rainfall 



M 











%M 



% 




c 



I F 



o 



7 



^ 






4^ 



1> 



> 



'ro^t 




. 






N 







c 



5 



c 




Plate IX. Mean July rainfall 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 203 

accustomed to the river from childhood, because of the 
places where they build their homes; hence they make 
excellent pilots. In their stout canoes they are able to 
navigate even dangerous rivers at great speed. 

In the region of dense forests and barren uplands along 
the upper waters of the Xingu the use of metal is entirely 
unknown; the tribes still live in the stone age of culture. 
The forest trees are felled with stone axes and a clearing 
is made for their small plantations. Stone drills are used 
in perforating their shell ornaments, and for knives they 
use the sharp teeth of the piranha, a river fish. Domestic 
animals are entirely unknown except pet parrots and a 
few other birds. They are ignorant of the banana in all 
its varieties, also of sugar cane and rice. The world of 
their religion is limited to the upper waters of the Xingu 
and the Tapajos. They have no idea of God, but believe 
in a soul that goes wandering about during sleep and after 
death. At least one tribe has been living so much apart 
from all the rest that it has developed a language quite 
unlike that of any other in South America, although at 
one time it must have had a speech like that of some 
parent tribe from which it came. 

The White Population in Brazil. Although the Portu- 
guese were the original owners of the country — a prince 
of Portugal was the first king of the short-lived Brazil- 
ian empire — and although descendants of Portuguese 
are to-day the ruling class, it is surprising to learn 
that there are only a few million of them in all Brazil. 
There are also one and a half million Italians and a 
quarter of a million Germans, besides considerable 
numbers of Spaniards, Turks, Russians, French, Austrians, 
and others. 

To-day one finds also a large number of blacks in 
Brazil; there are towns in which they form two thirds of 



20 4 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



the whole population. Bahia (Figs. 103 and 104) has 
often been called the city of blacks. There is no color 
line as we know it in the United States to-day. Whites 
and blacks mingle as freely as the whites. Perhaps one 
good reason for this is the fact that out of a total popula- 
tion of more than 
twenty million 
people there are 
but six millions of 
white blood. 

The Winds and 
Mountains of Bra- 
zil. Since climate 
— the immediate 
cause of the dif- 
ferent interests of 
Brazil — depends 
so much upon wind 
systems and relief 
it will be well to 
see what are the 
climatic effects 
produced by the 

mountains and 
port of Bahia, Brazil • , r 

winds of the 
country. We already know that the Amazon Basin is 
exceedingly flat. We need also to know that the Amazon 
Basin includes roughly the northern half of the country. 
The southern half is not low like the Amazon valley but 
stands several thousand feet above the sea and has many 
small and some large irregularities; it is a great plateau 
with a number of mountain ranges extending across it. 
The mountains are highest near the sea, and form a coastal 
fringe that walls off the interior from the strip of lowland 




Fig. 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

103. Looking across the bay from the 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 205 

on the coast (Plate VIII). Their different portions bear 
different names — Serra do Mar, Serra da Mantiqueira, 
and others,— but for our purpose let us call them the coast 
ranges. All the way from Cape Sao Roque at the east- 
ernmost point of Brazil to the southern end of the country, 
these mountains furnish a picturesque background to the 
coastal lands (Plate II). 

The winds of eastern and southeastern Brazil are the 
so-called southeast trades that blow the year round. They 
strike the coast of Brazil squarely after traversing the 
ocean, and a large part of the moisture which they carry 
is thus deposited on the seaward slopes of the coastal 
mountains, where it falls as rain. Since the trades blow 
constantly the seaward slopes of the mountains have 
almost daily rains; but since the winds blow with greater 
velocity and constancy at some seasons than at others 
there is more rain at one time than at another. The 
rainy season lasts through the southern summer (our 
winter); during the rest of the year there is some rain 
(Plates I, VII, and IX), but it falls in moderate amounts. 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 104. Bahia, one of the coastal cities of Brazil 



206 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 




The Seasons of Rain. Important differences in the 
time at which the rainy season occurs are brought about 
by the fact that the trade-wind belt is not fixed from 
one year's end to the' other. It migrates north and 
south with the sun, sometimes by great and again by 

small distances. This 
change in the position 
of the trade-wind belt 
affects the force of the 
winds and the amount 
of the rainfall as well 
as the time during 
which the greatest 
amount falls. The 
rainy season does not 
therefore always occur 
at all places through- 
out Brazil at the same 
time. At Rio de Janeiro the rains fall chiefly from 
November to March; at Pernambuco (Figs. 105, 106, 107) 
they fall from April to June ; and on the Amazon lands 
from December to May (Plates VII and IX) . It is interest- 
ing to know that the southeast trades serve the purpose of 
man not only through the rain they bring to the useful 
plants which man cultivates but also by the aid they give 
to navigation. In the interior they enable sailing vessels 
and canoes on the Amazon to drive before the wind up to 
the head of navigation. Since the trade winds blow more 
strongly by day than by night, those going up river in 
canoes or sailboats travel chiefly by day, when the wind 
helps them along; those going downstream often travel 
by night, since the wind does not then offset the current. 
Though there are well-marked dry and wet seasons there 
are also sharp differences in each season between the 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 105. Ox cart in Pernambuco, 
Brazil 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 207 

rainfalls of successive days. A moderate rainfall may 
change to a violent downpour lasting for weeks at a time. 
At long intervals tropical hurricanes may strike the coast, 
as at Rio in 181 7, when ships were torn from their 
anchors and hundreds of lives were lost. 

The Droughts of Ceara. One of the most interesting 
facts about the rainfall of Brazil is the way in which the 
mountains shield certain places from rain. One such 
region in the rain shadow of the mountains is the deep 
valley of the Sao Francisco, where the dryness is extreme. 
The plants look much like those of the Sahara, with thick 
leathery leaves capable of withstanding long droughts. 
Another bejt of light rainfall occurs northwest of Cape 
Sao Roque, where the general northwest direction of the 
coast happens to correspond with the course of the 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 



Fig. 106. Shipping at the port of Pernambuco, Brazil 



208 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

southeast trades. The winds therefore do not blow across 
the mountains, as they do farther south, but in the same 
direction. Thus they give up but little of their moisture 
and the country is, on the whole, very dry. 

At times the dryness of the region northwest of Cape 
Sao Roque is extreme and the people actually suffer. 
Such was the case in the state of Ceara at the close of 
the eighteenth century, when for four years there was 
very little rain. The vegetation dried up, springs and 
streams ceased to flow, the dry ground cracked open, 
and the live stock died, for there were then no plants to 
eat and no water to drink. Many people left the region 
and went to more favored places; those who stayed were, 
brought to the verge of starvation. Such periods of 
extreme dryness are bound to return — indeed, less extreme 
droughts occur every few years — and make the land far 
less safe than that south of the cape. The government is 
therefore building dams and canals for water storage and 
irrigation. When completed its projects will enable the peo- 
ple to avoid the extreme effects of the recurrent droughts. 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 107. Inner harbor at Pemambuco, Brazil 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 209 

The Dry Grasslands of the Plateau. Much more 
important than the dry coast north of Cape Sao Roque 
are the semi-dry tracts of the great interior plateau that 
constitutes almost a quarter of Brazil. The highest 
mountains and the greatest rainfall are on the coast near 
Rio de Janeiro. It is therefore easy to understand that 
there cannot be very much left for the interior. The 
moderate rains that fall upon the interior plateau support 
a growth of vegetation different from that of any other 
part of Brazil. It is a mixture of grass and shrubbery; 
one traveler says that it looks like an old English orchard. 
This is the grassland of southern Brazil, the land of 
cattle (Plates I and XI). 

The Hot and the Cool Places. The southeastern shore 
of Brazil is constantly fanned by the southeast trades and 
here, therefore, we find the coolest places and most of the 
people. Down near the shore at the foot of the coast 
ranges, where are most of the ports and large cities, it 
is very hot in spite of the trade winds. It is the great 
heat and moisture of the low country along the shore that 
cause unhealthful conditions and the numerous diseases 
— malaria, yellow fever, rheumatism, and scrofula — 
which have given Brazil such a bad reputation among the 
people of northern lands. In spite of its nearness to 
the equator the interior plateau is only moderately hot 
throughout the greater part of the summer season, for 
its altitude is great enough to save it from the intense 
heat of either the Amazon lowlands on the north or the 
coastal lowlands on the south. 

The Cool Region in Southern Brazil. In the same 
country in which great heat and luxuriant tropical vege- 
tation are common, one would hardly expect to find 
a cool region down near the level of the sea. Ecuador, 
Peru, and Colombia all have extremes of heat and cold, 
14 



210 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

but for the heat it is necessary to go to the lands near the 
level of the sea, and for the cold to the upper slopes of 
the lofty volcanoes. In Brazil, on the other hand, one 
finds these contrasts in going, not uphill, but in sailing 
southward along the coast. To be sure, southern Brazil 
is not a land of bitter cold, but it is so cold that water 
freezes on the higher campos or plains on clear winter 
nights, and in the states of Santa Catharina and Rio 
Grande do Sul cattle have been lost in snowstorms. It 
is here that one finds the greatest contrasts between 
summer and winter temperatures and something like our 
succession of seasons (Plates V and VI) . 

In this respect the climate of southern Brazil is far 
different from that of the Amazon valley, where the rains 
are almost constant and where the heat is almost always 
oppressive. Even Rio de Janeiro has relatively little 
change of temperature from summer to winter, the dif 
ference between these two seasons being less a difference 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 108. Coffee plantation, Brazil 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 211 

of temperature than one of rainfall. But in the south 
there are well-marked seasons differing from each other in 
respect to cloudiness and temperature though less as to 
rainfall; it is a land where winter means not only greater 
rainfall but also greater cold. 

A New Germany in Brazil. Southern Brazil is unlike 
the rest of the country in many other respects. We find 
here not only a climate but also a people different from 
those in the Amazon valley and in the region about Rio. 
The national language of Brazil is not more frequently 
heard in southern Brazil than is Italian or German. Brazil 
was first owned and settled by the Portuguese, and it 
is Portuguese that one hears in the cities along the coast 
and in the capital of the country. But in the south one 
hears most of the people speaking German or Italian. 
Neudorf and Blumenau are names of farming settlements 
which suggest not Brazil but Germany. In fact, there are 
so many Germans living in southern Brazil that some 
people hastily conclude that Germany will some time own 
or claim this part of the country, or that the Germans 
will form a republic here, a sort of new Fatherland in 
South America. But the government of Brazil is on the 
whole good, and there is no reason why the Germans should 
ever form a separate state. Where the people have no 
real grievance a revolution cannot be supported. The 
Germans of Brazil, like the Germans of the United States, 
will probably always be citizens of the republic in which 
they have reared their new homes, however much their 
thoughts may turn to the Fatherland. 

The Campos. We shall now turn to the interior 
grasslands or campos of Brazil in the states of Matto 
Grosso and Goyaz, where both climate and industries 
are quite unlike those of the low coastal region near Rio, 
or the coffee region of Sao Paulo (Fig. 109) or temperate 



212 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

southern Brazil in the states of Parana, Santa Catharina, 
and Rio Grande do Sul. Wherever we find civilized 
man we are sure to find his habits and customs, the way 
in which he wins his daily bread, and the nature of his 
commerce influenced largely by the kinds of plants that 
grow about him. Man depends upon plants for a large 
share of his food, and since the useful plants are of many 
varieties they require many different kinds of labor. 
Man may desire the materials that plants produce, as 
the latex of the rubber tree for rubber, or the fiber of 
the henequen for sisal hemp, or the nut of the coconut 
palm for food. We shall therefore wish to know first 
of all what kinds of plants grow in southern Brazil and 
then we shall be able the better to understand the life 
of the people who dwell there. 

The rains of much of the interior plateau are light 
and the larger plants form open woods or shrubbery. 
The country is chiefly grown up to grass, and here we 
find the great pastures and herds of Brazil (Plate XI). 
The people of the far interior are therefore ranchmen and 
cattle owners chiefly, while those nearer the seacoast are 
engaged principally in the growth of coffee (Fig. 108), 
rice, and sugar cane. 

The Grasses of the Campos. The grass of the campos 
is of many varieties, but perhaps the two most important 
kinds are the "goat's-beard" tufted grass and the catin- 
gueiro ; the former is of poor quality, but the latter makes 
excellent pasturage for cattle and horses. Where, the 
goat's-beard grass is burnt off and the catingueiro planted 
the latter is able to grow in place of the former. In 
some places European grasses are successfully raised, 
and it is almost certain that with proper care alfalfa and 
other forage crops could be grown to provide fodder 
during the dry season. In the main, the soil is good 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OP MANY INTERESTS 213 

throughout "this immense area, and although in some 
places the rainfall is too light for agriculture without 
irrigation, grasses may everywhere be grown in quantities 
large enough to support far greater herds of cattle than 
one finds there to-day. The region is much better off 
than a great deal of the range or cattle country of our 
western states, where good crops and many cattle are 
produced by the wise use of water and by proper atten- 
tion to grasses with long roots that go in search of under- 
ground water. 

The government of Brazil is helping the people by ex- 
perimenting with grains, grasses, and vegetables of all 
sorts and in this way is trying to find out just what kind 
of plants will do well in a particular kind of soil with a 
given amount of rainfall. It is interesting to know that 
seeds of wheat and corn are brought -from the western 
part of the United States, where plants have become ac- 
customed to dryness, just as we bring to the United 
States many kinds of grain from Asia, where plants have 
lived thousands of years in dry places and have learned 
to get along with far smaller amounts of water than those 
in the wet regions of Europe and the eastern part of 
the United States. 

"The contrast between the campos (the grasslands of 
the interior) and the sea level conditions is remarkable. 
The seaward slopes of the mountains are covered with the 
most luxuriant vegetation. The trees are overhung with 
moss, creepers, and parasitic plants of all kinds. The 
undergrowth is a tangled mass of low shrubs, bamboos, 
and brakes. Palms, which are absent on the campos, 
are seen soon after commencing the descent. Then 
come banana trees, at first singly and scattering; then 
more and more thickly. On the lower slopes, and espe- 
cially on the lowlands near sea level, sugar cane, banana 



214 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

groves, guavas, and paw-paws furnish striking evidence 
of the change from the cooler and drier interior upland 
campos to the wanner and rainier seaward slopes where 
frost is unknown. The change in temperature and in 
humidity during the descent is very striking. It was 
significant that the freight on the campos consisted of 
cattle, while on the seacoast lowlands cars full of bananas 
were attached to the train." (Ward.) 

The Rice Farms of the Coast. One of the great sources 
of food in Brazil that has been overlooked for many years 
is the rice plant. Jhe climate and soil of Brazil are excel- 
lent for the growing of abundant crops of rice; yet until 
a few years ago almost all the rice used by the people was 
brought in from other countries, chiefly from the Cape 
Verde Islands, the United States, and India. It is as 
if we brought our wheat from Egypt instead of growing 
it ourselves on the prairies of Dakota, Minnesota, and 
other central- western states. Rice was so generally used 
by the people of Brazil as a cheap food that the trade in 
it amounted to many thousands of tons in the city of Rio 
alone, and about a hundred thousand tons in all Brazil. 
The higher government tax of later years has made the 
rice dearer, and the people are now eating less, and 
instead of importing it they are learning to grow it them- 
selves though still at great expense. 

At Moreira Cesar in the state of Sao Paulo a man from 
Louisiana is running an experimental rice farm where 
students are learning to grow Japanese rice with very good 
results. It shows how near we are to other peoples of 
the world to-day to learn that a man from Louisiana is 
showing some of the farmers of Brazil how to grow 
Japanese rice instead of importing rice grown in India, 
and brought to Brazil in German and British steamers. 

Two kinds of rice are grown, an upland and a lowland 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 215 

variety. The lowland rice must be irrigated as in Loui- 
siana and is most conveniently grown in low places; the 
upland rice may be sown like any grain, and in the state 
of Sao Paulo large quantities of it are produced on strips 
of land between the coffee trees. 

The Araucaria and Paraguay Tea. Many millions of 
years ago there grew on the earth strange trees for the 
most part quite unlike those now living. They were 
the ancestors of our modern trees and very few of them 
can now be found. One of those still living is the 
araucaria, or monkey-puzzle tree, found in southwestern 
Brazil and on both the eastern and western sides of 
the Andes Mountains of Chile and the Argentine in lati- 
tude thirty-five to forty degrees south. A relative. of this 
tree is the araucaria, or monkey-puzzle plant, grown in 
pots indoors in northern climates. The araucaria forests 
have little undergrowth. The trees have umbrella-shaped 
crowns and straight trunks, valuable for lumber; and the 
nuts form an important article of food (Plate XI). 

Another plant useful to the people of southwestern 
Brazil and neighboring parts of the Argentine, Uruguay, 
and Paraguay is the yerba mate or Paraguay tea, which 
is not at all a real tea but a kind of holly. The Indians 
of the region, at the time the whites first came, crushed 
its small dried stems and leaves, added hot water, and 
thus obtained a useful drink. The Jesuit missionaries 
liked Paraguay tea so much that they adopted the Indian 
custom of drinking it. 

So important is the growing of mate as a means of 
livelihood for many people, and so generally is mate 
used by many people of South America, that we shall 
wish to know how the plant grows and how the leaves are 
cured. The mate shrub is from ten to twenty feet high. 
It grows naturally at an elevation about fifteen hundred 



216 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

feet above the sea on the interior plateaus of the states 
of Parana and Matto Grosso, and while most of it is 
gathered from wild shrubs it is in some places cultivated 
on plantations like other useful plants of the region. 
It is brought to the preparing factories in burlap or 
rawhide bags. After being thoroughly dried in ovens, 
it is passed through a number of screens, which separate 
the leaves and the stems according to sizes. The coarsest 
stems are used as fuel ; the less coarse are sold as cheaper 
kinds of mate. The leaves are then sorted according to 
quality and crushed in machines from which the mate 
comes as a fine olive-green powder. 

The people who drink mate are very enthusiastic about 
it and claim for it far more excellent qualities than tea 
and coffee possess. It does not make its users sleepless 
and nervous, as tea and coffee do when used to excess, and 
it is said to have certain important medicinal qualities. 
It is prepared for drinking much like ordinary tea and 
may be drunk in a cup if it is carefully strained. The 
commoner way, however, is to leave the half -crushed tea 
in the cup, and suck up the fluid through a tube called 
a bombilla. At the lower end of the tube is a strainer 
which keeps out the powder. A bombilla set is prized 
somewhat as the American lady prizes her tea set, and 
many people otherwise quite poor have beautifully made 
sets, the tube in some cases consisting of pure silver and 
the cup of carved wood adorned with silver. 

Most of the mate produced in Brazil is shipped to the 
Argentine, but some is now also shipped to France, where 
the people are learning to use it. The Argentine uses 
seven times as much mate as coffee, and twenty-six times 
as much mate as tea; and the people of Chile, Uruguay, 
and Paraguay prefer it to ordinary tea and coffee. 

The Soil of Brazil. Some peculiar features of Brazil 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 217 

must be mentioned here to explain the limited fertility 
of part of its land. Among them is the absence of the 
earthworm. This worm helps to maintain the fertility 
of the ground in which it lives by constantly grinding it 
up and stirring the soil as well as by carrying down into 
the ground small leaves and the narrow blades of grass 
which, upon decay, enrich the soil. To some extent 
the lack of earthworms in the soil of Brazil is made up 
by the great numbers of ants that burrow deep into the 
ground and cover the surface with their huge homes. 
A further disadvantage under which the land produces 
plants lies in the fact that most of the cultivated soil of 
Brazil has no true winter season in which the land "sleeps," 
that is, does not produce crops. In our country the 
winter season is the one in which plant food, the product 
of chemical changes in the soil, keeps on gathering for the 
next season's growth; in Brazil plants are growing most 
or all of the year,, and the soil is kept drained of its supply 
of plant food. 

The Coffee Region of Brazil. Even if Brazil has forested 
tracts too dense for man's conquest, campos too dry for 
agriculture, and coastal lowlands too hot and unheal thful 
for man's comfort and safety, the country possesses at 
least one unrivaled resource: climate and soil along the 
border of the country where the coast is backed by 
mountains are among the finest in the world for the 
growing of coffee (Fig. 109). To this advantage we must 
add another — the lands that produce the best coffee are 
located near the sea where short railways connect the 
plantations with the sea. This is of the greatest impor- 
tance in a tropical country like Brazil, for it may happen 
in such hot lands that the forests are so dense and the 
lands so remote from the sea that railway building is 
almost impossible, and though the land would produce 



218 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

good crops man is unable to raise them because he cannot 
market his products. There is not a single railway in the 




After a map by R. De C. Ward 



Fig. 109. Coffee district 
whole of the Amazon Basin except the short one recently 
built about the rapids of the Madeira (Fig. 136); in the 
Mississippi valley, also of great size, there are thousands 
of miles of railways. The mountain streams of Brazil are 
swift and unnavigable, yet it is on the slopes of the tropi- 
cal mountains, and on the interior plateaus, that the best 
coffee is grown. Railways are required, but railways 
are expensive anywhere, and exceedingly expensive in 
tropical countries, where labor is scarce and operation 
costs are high (Fig. 102). 

The climate and soil of Brazil are well adapted to 
coffee, insect pests are scarce, the extent of land capable 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OP MANY INTERESTS 219 

of growing coffee is very great, and short railways descend 
steeply to sea level. For these reasons Brazil has become 
the greatest coffee country in the world, and if one visit 
New York harbor and look among the incoming vessels 
for a coffee steamer the chances are ten to one that it 
has come from Brazil and that the name of a Brazilian 
firm will be stamped upon the sacks in which the coffee 
is shipped. 

The Coffee Ships of the World at the Gates of Brazil. 
Many of the countries of the world send vessels to the gates 
of Brazil, the harbors of Rio de Janeiro and Santos (Fig. 
no). Brazil may be said to levy tribute on all coffee- 
importing peoples. Since a large part of the coffee is 
shipped to the United States, we are naturally much 
interested in the country of its origin. The best coffee 
lands of Brazil are chiefly in the state of Sao Paulo. 
Almost the entire energy of the people of this state is 
absorbed in the raising, curing, and shipping of this 




Fig. no. The central market of Santos, Brazil. To this artificial 

basin boats come with vegetables from many plantations 

for the people of the city of Santos 



220 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

single product. It makes one think of the cotton states 
of our South, where every cotton grower talks and thinks 
chiefly about cotton. 

The plantations of Sao Paulo are laid out at elevations 
from one thousand to three thousand feet above sea level 
and cover thousands of square miles. No other state 
is so exclusively devoted to the production of the coffee 
berry, since none other has a climate and soil so nearly 
ideal. Row upon row of coffee trees stretch out in every 
direction; in places they seem almost like a forest. Large 
plantations are the rule ; some are so large that they have 
railroad tracks running through them for the quicker 
delivery of the coffee crop to the central warehouses. 
The best berries are grown in the famous red soils, their 
color being due to the presence of iron — thought to be 
beneficial for coffee. 

Coffee Planting. The young coffee plant requires 
tender care for its best growth. It will wither and die 
if left exposed to the hot sun, so the coffee plantations 
are in some cases planted to bananas, which grow quickly 
and shelter the coffee plant from the direct rays of the 
tropical sun. When the coffee bushes are large enough 
to take care of themselves the bananas are removed. In 
some plantations the coffee is planted among the original 
growth of trees and shrubs and when large enough to 
take care of itself this growth is cut away. Sometimes 
sticks or leaves are put over the youngest plants to pro- 
tect them from the sun, or they are covered with awnings 
of cheap cotton cloth. In Sao Paulo less care need be 
exercised over young plants than elsewhere since the sum- 
mer sun is less powerful here than in the warmer states 
farther north. If the plantations are kept carefully 
weeded, each tree will produce three or four pounds of 
coffee beans every year (Fig. 108). 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 221 

Coffee berries in their natural state are quite unlike the 
coffee we see in the grocery stores of this country. The 
coffee beans that we know are the roasted seeds of coffee 
berries that grow in large clusters close to the limbs 
of the low coffee tree or bush and look quite like dark 
red cherries. Each berry contains two seeds whose flat 
faces are pressed close together; when dried and roasted 
these seeds form the coffee bean of commerce. The 
trees begin to blossom in December; the berries ripen and 
the picking begins in April or May. 

Preparing Coffee for Market. When the coffee pickers 
bring berries to the factories they are doing only the first 
of a long series of tasks necessary to prepare the product 
for market. The soft pulp surrounding the berries must 
be removed by machines which crush the pulp but do not 
harm the hard berry inside. The combined mass of pulp 
and seeds is then passed into a cylinder with holes through 
which only the coffee beans pass. It reminds one very 
much of the screens of a stone-crushing machine, where 
the small particles of stone are allowed to pass through 
the" screen but the large pieces are passed over it into a 
separate heap. After this the beans are washed clean 
in large tanks from which they come -as white as snow. 
They must then be thoroughly dried in yards called ter- 
reiros, almost like fields, which are paved with cement 
that becomes very hot in the sun. Thorough drying 
takes several weeks, for if the berries are not perfectly 
dry they spoil on the long ocean voyages between Brazil 
and the ports of England, Germany, France, and the 
United States. 

During the drying process the berries are carefully 
watched, stirred with wooden rakes, and covered at 
night to protect them from the dew or the rain (Fig. in). 
In place of the drying courts a new system of steam 



222 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



drying has come into use that may soon very largely take 
the place of the old method. By it the coffee is thoroughly 



t jfc -*~«-«..i.aa^ »!• 


%fe ft**fr 


uuuiv jAnMM#*Ni*f 


."..V:,,,::.,...---- — -— ^-&- 




.' :; ^s^-'~ "^v 7 .- 



Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. hi. Drying coffee, Sao Paulo, Brazil 

dried in a few hours and the long delay and uncertainty 
and the great cost of the old system are done away with, 
though the coffee is not always improved in quality. 

When perfectly dry the beans are placed in machines 
that remove the white outer skin and expose the olive- 
green surface of the berry that we know so well. Still 
another treatment must be undergone before the beans 
are ready for shipment. They are of different sizes, and 
must be sorted and graded by passing through sieves of 
different sizes, from which the coffee runs out in tubes 
and finally into bags containing one hundred and thirty- 
two pounds each. In this form it is ready for shipment 
(Figs. 112 and 113). 

The Villages of the Coffee Plantations. So long a 
series of treatments and such large estates require a 'great 
many men, and in some places one finds the laborers 
of a single estate numbering thousands. In general, 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OP MANY INTERESTS 223 

these live in villages, and the village life of the coffee 
estates is quite distinct from the life of the great cities on 
the coast. There are large stores where laborers buy food, 
a bakery where they may purchase bread, a foundry, 
and often a sawmill where is sawed the lumber out of 
which their little one-story houses are built. Formerly 
the coffee plantations were worked by slaves, negroes 
brought from Africa as once they were brought into 
our country for the cotton and sugar plantations of the 
South. But, following the example of most slave-holding 
countries, the Brazilians in the year 1888 set all the 
blacks free. There were at that time about a half million 
slaves in Brazil, and the sudden freeing of all these people 
was a severe blow to both the coffee and the sugar 
industries. 

Many of the negroes thought freedom meant that 




Courtesy of the Pan-American TTw». 

Fig. 112. Coffee warehouse, Santos, Brazil. Weighing and storing 
coffee in preparation for shipment abroad 



224 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

they would not have to work at all, and many of them 
became loafers and criminals in the large towns to which 
they drifted. After a time some of the negroes regarded 
their freedom more sensibly and went back to work on 
the plantations. To add to the number of laborers the 
government made it easy for foreigners to enter the coun- 
try, and to-day one finds them in thousands on the coffee 
estates, where the Italians especially make excellent work- 
men. The negroes once slaves,., or the . descendants 
of slaves, are still too largely gathered . 'in the .towns 
where, as in Bahia for instance, they form a surprisingly 
large part of the total population. Bahia looks indeed 
like a city of negroes, more African than Brazilian. 

The Region of Mines. North of Rio de Janeiro is 
one of the most important provinces of Brazil, for it is 
the center of the mining industry, "the region of mines." 
Its name is easy to remember for it is Minas Geraes, 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyee 

Fig. 113. JLoading. coffee for the United States market, Santos 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 225 

which means general or universal mines. Mines of gold, 
silver, copper, and iron are found in it, and the product 
of only that part of it nearest the seacoast may be sent 
easily to the markets of the world, a rare thing in South 
America. There are a few railways in the province, but 
more are needed to complete the connection with the 
coast and enable people the better to develop the interior. 
While gold is now the chief product of the mines the 
diamond industry is quite as famous. The diamonds 
are, however, not nearly so valuable as those from South 
Africa. They are black in color and are used chiefly in 
diamond drills for rock boring. 

The city of Diamantina is the center of the diamond 
and gold mining country and may be reached in two 
ways. One may leave the railway at Curvello and take 
a mule train for the three or four days' journey that sepa- 
rates the city from the end of the railway, or one may 
leave the railway at Curalinho farther north and go by 
coach and wagon. Either way is exceedingly difficult 
and shows not only how hard it is to get provisions and 
machinery to the city, but also with what trouble the 
exports are sent away. American rough-road wagons are 
being brought in gradually and have helped greatly in mak- 
ing the movement of men and goods cheaper and easier. 

It is rather striking, on leaving the United States far 
behind, to go to the end of the railway in Minas Geraes, 
take a mule train to the Jequitinhonha River country, 
and find there American wagons. It recalls the fact 
that before the end of the railway in southern Peru had 
reached Cuzco, the old capital of the Inca empire, one 
could ride from the railway to Cuzco in a Cincinnati 
surrey. It is like going to Egypt to ride behind a Baldwin 
locomotive made in Philadelphia, or to Siberia to cross 
an iron or steel bridge made in Connecticut. 
15 



226 vSOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Iron Mines and their Influence on Future Develop- 
ment. Far more important than any other mineral 
resources of Brazil are the iron mines of Minas Geraes, 
where it has been estimated that there are two billion 
tons of iron ore. The high-grade massive hematite and 
the thin-bedded laminated hematite, or jacutinga, con- 
taining sixty-three to sixty-nine per cent iron, make up 
a tonnage which is probably nearly as great as the reserve 
of iron ore left to-day in the Lake Superior region of the 
United States. Some individual deposits contain several 
hundreds of millions of tons. As the district is only a 
little over three hundred miles north of Rio de Janeiro and 
the ore may be hauled down hill on a railway already 
built to Rio and another partly completed from the port 
of Victoria north of Rio de Janeiro, the future should see 
large shipments of iron ore to the United States and 
Europe. If large quantities of coal are ever found in 
Brazil, or if electric smelting becomes effective, there is 
no reason why Brazil should not have a great iron and 
steel manufacturing industry and make its own steel 
rails, locomotives, bridges, steel buildings, sewing ma- 
chines, and ships as well as those of the Argentine and 
other parts of South America. 

How the Mines have Helped the Farms. One indus- 
try often helps another, and this principle is well shown 
in the manner in which the mines of Minas Geraes have 
helped farming and grazing. The forage for mules and 
the provisions for men that work in the mines require 
considerable work on the part of people who do not mine 
but who depend on the farm and the ranch for a living. 
Some sections of Minas Geraes are like many of the 
settlements in Nevada where mining is an important 
industry. The men in the mines require food, and asso- 
ciated with each group of mines are people who are not 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 227 

miners but who depend for a living on the supplies they 
sell to the miners. American agricultural machinery is 
being slowly introduced into Minas Geraes to better the 
farming conditions and supply cheaper food to the mines. 
The province has immense herds of cattle and mules 
that graze on the campinas or upland prairies, besides 
many flocks of sheep; its soil is fertile and, when properly 
cultivated, yields valuable crops, and its forests contain 
choice timber, balsams, drugs, and dye woods. 

Although Minas Geraes is most celebrated for its 
mines, its most valuable product is. coffee; it also pro- 
duces sugar, tobacco, and cotton. We must not suppose 
that because gold and diamonds in even large quantities 
are found in any region that they represent the most 
valuable riches of the country. The richest diamond or 
gold region in the world does not produce in the long run 
anything like the riches that are to be found in the soil. 

Vast Forests and Little Lumber. One of the greatest 
of the resources of Brazil is its large and varied supply 
of useful woods. With the rapid increase in the past 
few hundred years of the civilized peoples who use wood, 
the forests of the north temperate zone are gradually 
disappearing and the supply becoming too small to 
satisfy the needs of the people. England imports most 
of the wood used in that country ; Germany imports 
vast amounts in spite of the fact that her forests are well 
cared for; and even with our great forests in the United 
States care must be taken lest in a few years we have not 
enough wood to supply our rapidly increasing population. 

But down in the heart of Brazil is a vast forest where 
man will never extensively clear the ground for agricul- 
ture, or at least will not clear it for centuries to come. 
Here are to be found woods of many kinds for many uses 
and to an increasing extent these woods are being shipped 



228 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

to the people of northern countries. Mahogany is used 
for making furniture, for trimmings in houses and boats, 
and as a substitute for hard woods such as walnut, maple, 
and oak; many kinds of tropical cedars are now brought 
into northern countries for making boxes, and to some 
extent also in making furniture; there are also imported 
dyewoods and various other woods from which drugs are 
obtained (Plate XI). 

The rich vegetable growth of tropical lands, with their 
abundant rains, must not lead us to suppose that lumber 
can be easily obtained in the Amazon valley. We hear 
so much about the dense tropical forests of Brazil that 
we may find ourselves having wrong notions about the 
timber and lumber resources of the region. The forests 
are indeed vast, and they are truly dense, but if one looks 
through them for a particular wood, one finds that trees 
of a kind do not grow in groves or over vast areas to the 
exclusion of all other trees, as is the case to a large extent 
with the trees and forests of the United States. One will 
find a rubber tree here and a cedar there, and beyond 
the cedar a tangle of vines ; or only a clump of mahogany 
trees in one place and another clump a long way off and 
separated from the first clump by dense thickets of vines 
and bushes or by useless trees. Lumbering in a trop- 
ical forest is therefore very hard work and very expen- 
sive. 

The difficulties of tropical forestry are further increased 
by the fact that the streams are the only highways on 
which the timber can be transported, and therefore lum- 
bering can be done only on the banks of the streams or 
very close to them. The marshy ground does not make 
it possible to put the timber on wagons and haul it out 
to the river even if an opening be cut through the wall of 
vegetation. Further, when the different kinds of logs 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OP MANY INTERESTS 229 

are brought to the banks of the streams, many are so 
heavy that they cannot be floated to the mill like the 
timber in this country. 

The Name "Brazil" from a Kind of Wood. It is a 
pleasing thought that the country having the greatest 
single expanse of tropical forest in the world should have 
derived its name from a kind of wood. When the news 
reached Portugal early in the sixteenth century that 
there was a great land mass to the southeast, Emanuel, 
the king, asked Americus Vespucius to explore the coun- 
try, and gave him three vessels for the service. In the 
second voyage of this explorer (after whom America was 
named) he reached the coast of South America, anchored 
in a safe harbor, and for five months rested and kept up 
a trade with the Indians. On his return he brought to 
Portugal a cargo of brazilwood. This had been used as 
a dyewood for three hundred years before the discovery 
of America and was one of the precious substances brought 
from India by the great traders of Venice and Genoa. 
When it became known that brazilwood grew abundantly 
in the tropical forests in this part of South America, the 
name Brazil came gradually into use as the name of the 
country from which the brazilwood was obtained, and 
Brazil it has been ever since. 

The Wonderful Carnauba Tree. Among the other 
valuable woods of Brazil perhaps the most wonderful in 
its general service to man is the carnauba tree, which 
grows naturally in a large territory in the eastern seacoast 
states. It is always green and vigorous even in times of 
long and severe drought. Its roots produce a medicine 
as good as sarsaparilla, its stem affords strong, light fibers 
which have a beautiful luster, and it serves also for timbers 
and rafters for houses and for stakes used in making fences. 
Wine and vinegar as well as sugar and starch are made 



230 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

from parts of the tree. In those places that have periods 
of drought, as Ceara and Parnahyba, the poorer classes 
depend upon it to a great extent for food when their 
ordinary supply gives out. Its fruit is also used for 
feeding cattle. The pulp of the wood has a pleasant taste, 
and the milky nut is sometimes used in place of coffee. 
Hats, baskets, brooms, and mats are made from the straw 
obtained from its leaves. The straw is also used for 
thatching houses, and some of it is shipped to other parts 
of Brazil and even to Europe, where it is used in the 
manufacture of hats. The pith of the tree may be used 
as a substitute for cork; salt is extracted from it, and also 
an alkali used in the manufacture of common soap. 
Perhaps the most important use of all is the wax derived 
from the leaves and made into candles in common use 
throughout Brazil. 

The Most Beautiful City in South America. The 
natural beauty of the city of Rio de Janeiro is far greater 
than that of all but a few of the most beautiful cities of the 
world. Viewed from the sea it is a Naples or a Constanti- 
nople; the islands in the harbor of Rio are like the 
choicest bits of the ^Egean islands or the entrancing islets 
of the Azores ; while the steep mountains that encircle the 
bay have all the beauty and grandeur of the Norwegian 
fiords combined with the lavish color and beauty of dense 
tropical vegetation. Nature has given the city a setting 
that surpasses the imagination. And in the few details 
in which nature might be said to be imperfect, man 
has changed nature and so completed the beauty of 
the picture and made Rio the wonder and admiration 
of all travelers. The wonder is the greater because we of 
the northern half of the earth have so poor a notion of 
the great cities in the southern hemisphere. We are 
told that more than ninety per cent of all the people of 



brazil: "country: "OF. MANY" interests- 231. 



the world live in the northern hemisphere, and from this 
statement- we get the wrong idea that all the interesting 
cities are-to be found in the lands north of the equator. 

The Old and the New Rio. It is worth while to know 
that the city of Rio has been made more beautiful since 
man has adapted it to the natural beauty of the islands, 
the sea, and the encircling hills (Fig. 114). Twenty years 
ago it consisted of a more or less disjointed group of small 
villages thrust between the mountains on the west side of 
a great bay. Some of the settlements clung to the edge 
of the land, others ran far up along the small valleys 
between the hills, or upon their lower slopes. There 
were a few beautiful parks and buildings, and while 
the whole effect of the city was beautiful it lacked unity 
as well as adaptation to the surrounding landscape. 

It was no child's play to remodel the city. Sixty 
million dollars had to be raised. No such change was 
ever made in any other city of the world, except perhaps 



■■■-■'™*e®m*mm 


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SB^- 




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Fig. 114. 



Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Botafogo, Avenida Beiro Mar, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 



232 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

when Peter the Great built Petrograd up on the frozen 
marshes of the Neva or when Paris was cut through and 




y of the Pan-American Union 



Fig. ii 



5. Avenida Central, Rio de Janeiro, a street widened at great 
expense and in harmony with the surroundings 



through by a half-dozen great avenues. The work was 
begun in September, 1903. First there was constructed 
a quay more than two miles long, following the general 
curve of part of the shore. Inside the quay there was 
built a broad avenue parallel to the shore and more than 
four miles long. Both quay and avenue are among 
the most prominent features in a general view of the city. 
A canal known as the Mangue was straightened and 
extended toward the sea and flanked by an electric-lighted 
avenue nearly two miles long and one hundred and 
thirty-one feet wide. The streets were paved with 
asphalt, the sewer and water-supply systems were enlarged 
and perfected to do away with the scourge of fever, 
certain hills were cut down, and there was built a great 
central avenue, called the Avenida Central, or Rio Branco, 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 2y 

more than a mile long and one hundred and eight feet 
wide, bordered by trees and beautiful and imposing 
buildings (Figs. 115 and 117). The view of the harbor and 
city that One may obtain from the top of the Corcovado 
and the Pao de Assucar (Sugar-loaf) is perhaps the most 
wonderful of all the celebrated views of natural wonders 
in the world. The tops of these two striking, steep- 
walled peaks may be reached, the one by rail, the other 
by an aerial tramway which carries one out over the 
forest and to the summit, from which one looks down upon 
the city and its beautiful suburb, Botafogo — almost as 
from an aeroplane or an airship (Figs. 114 and 116). 

Why Brazilians are so fond of Rio. One can under- 
stand the pride of the people of Rio in their city when one 
remembers that it is by far the largest and the most 
beautiful city in the whole country. In spite of the fact 
that Brazil contains more than twenty million people it has 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 116. View of Rio de Janeiro, city and harbor, Brazil. The 
tooth-shaped island in the bay is called the Sugar-loaf 



234 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



but six cities with a population exceeding one hundred 
thousand. And among these cities Rio is not only much 






urtesy of the Pan-Ai 



Fig. 117. Monroe Palace, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Where the 
third International American Conference was held 

the largest, but also the second largest in all South Amer- j 
iea, with more than a million people. It is, therefore,: 
the second largest city in the southern hemisphere. In 
the three great provinces of Amazonas, Goyaz, and: 
Matto Grosso in the great interior of Brazil, which have : 
a combined area almost exactly half as great as the area 
of the United States, there are only three cities — Manaos, 
Goyaz, and Cuyaba — with a population exceeding ten 
thousand. 

The Famous Harbor at Rio. The bay of Rio de Janeiro 
is one of the great scenic features of the world. It 
forms a bottle-shaped entrance to the city and the adjacent 
lands; and the largest steamers of the world find here 



BRAZIL: COUNTRY OF MANY INTERESTS 235 

deep water and capacious anchorage grounds. To the 
left of the entrance to the famous bay are a number of 
fantastic hills that look strikingly like a recumbent 
human figure and have therefore been called "The Stone 
Man." The curious " Sugar-loaf" forms the feet, and the 
"Gavia" the face in profile. "The bay itself presents 
one of the grandest prospects it is possible to imagine. 
Huge granitic piles, assuming the most eccentric outlines, 
present steep slopes which rise sheer above the surface 
and take on either side of the entrance the aspect of 
natural fortresses." (Keane.) Except for the narrow 
entrance the bay is landlocked; and it is studded with 
many islands and rocky crags, some of which are fortified, 
as are also some of the surrounding hills. No other bay 
in the southern hemisphere, except that at Sydney, 
New South Wales, is at once so beautiful and so service- 
able as the bay of Rio de Janeiro. 

The slopes of the mountains that inclose the bay of 
Rio de Janeiro are covered with a forest of tropical trees 
and shrubs. There is an almost endless variety of palms, 
long creepers festoon the giant trees, beautiful flowers 
and brightly colored insects supply gorgeous colors, and 
ferns and mosses add a touch of delicate beauty that 
perfects the scene. 

The Long Barrier Reef of Brazil. Fringing the eastern 
shore of Brazil for several hundred miles is a long reef 
known as the barrier reef of Brazil. Toward the south 
it is composed chiefly of coral. The northern part of it 
is one of the unique features not only of Brazil but of 
South America, since it consists not of coral but of hard 
sandstone. 

It is explained by supposing that the heavy surf once 
threw up a long reef of sand such as the reefs that now 
occur along the eastern coast of the United States from 



236 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Long Island to Texas. Back of the reef thus formed 
countless millions of small sea organisms lived, and their 
decaying bodies furnished an acid that with the salt of 
the sea water formed a cement. In past ages the cement 
hardened the sand and transformed it into sandstone. 
Some sections of the reef are just at the water surface, 
others stand some distance above, and still others are 
quite submerged. In places one may walk along it for 
miles without stepping into the water. The constant 
beating of the waves has broken it here and there, but 
on the whole the breaks occur only where rivers from the 
land have kept open a passage. 

Within the reef and between it and the mainland there 
is a long strip of water as calm and peaceful as the water 
of the outer edge is rough. The harbor of Pemambuco 
(Fig. 107) is not only formed by the lagoon behind the 
sand reef, but it is also protected from the heavy seas by 
the reef itself, which in this case has been raised higher 
by a stone wall and thus converted into a breakwater 
half natural, half artificial. 

We need to know one other fact about this part of the 
Brazilian coast to understand the harbors. The land 
was once higher than now; and while it stood at the 
higher elevation the rivers cut their valleys deep below 
the level of the coastal plateau which they drain. Later 
on the land was depressed, or drowned as geographers 
say; each river valley was entered by the sea and its 
lower course enlarged into a bay. For this reason every 
river has a sort of pouch-shaped lower portion, on whose 
shores cities have grown up and into which boats may 
sail. 



CHAPTER XIII 

AMAZONIA: LAND OF GREAT FORESTS 
AND RIVERS 

A Spanish Admiral's Opinion of the Amazon. Over 

three hundred and fifty years ago, Lope de Aguirre, an 
admiral of Spain, made a long voyage down the Amazon 
and, upon reaching the coast, sent a letter to his king, 
Philip II, telling him about the river. So difficult had 
been the journey that the admiral finished his letter by 
saying, "God knows how we got through that great mass 
of water. I advise thee, O great king, never to send 
Spanish fleets into that cursed river." This advice is 
worth recalling here to show how difficult is the great 
Amazon, with its shifting channels and sand bars, its 
plague of insects, and its great heat. In all these three 
hundred and fifty years man has really learned little 
about the river except at those places where the valuable 
rubber tree is found. Many a village on the Amazon and 
its tributaries was wholly unknown until rubber was dis- 
covered in the region, and to-day remains un visited by 
boats except those propelled by the paddle and the oar. 

" It flows at times for hundreds of miles without passing 
a human habitation; or if here and there, along this 
desolate stretch, smoke arises to show that human beings 
are sheltered beneath the roof of the rude hut that barely 
shows .itself amid the tropical green, it will come from the 
fire of a half savage, or of a runaway slave who has hid- 
den himself in the fastnesses of the forest, away from his 
enemy, the white man. Attempts have been made to set- 
tle the river, but the Jesuits, indefatigable as they were, 
failed; and the people of [our] South who at the close of 

237 



238 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the war came to Santarem, were equally unsuccessful. It 
remains to-day, as it has been for ages, silent and mys- 
terious, its banks unfrequented, and its waters unknown." 
(Church, 1878.) Though this description was written 
long ago it is as true of a great part of the Amazon 
Basin now as then, and serves to bring out the fact that 
there are but few people in all this vast tract of alter- 
nating forest and stream (Fig. 118.) 

The Great Amazon. The mouth of a great river is 
often the gateway to a great country. In the vast interior 
of South America one may travel for days, even weeks, 
across or up or down stream after stream, large and 
small, and find everywhere that the water is moving 
toward a common line, the Amazon. The entrance to 
this all but trackless interior is the mouth of the Amazon 
north of Para. It is therefore not without reason that 
the people of Para speak of the Amazon as the Mediter- 
ranean of South America. One may sail or steam up 
its wide mouth as up a great arm of the sea and not be 




Fig. 118. Settlement on the Amazon River. Dense tropical 
vegetation and heavily thatched houses 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 239 

able to make out either bank, so distant from each other 
are the opposite sides of the river. One might put the 
whole of Scotland into the mouth of this river and leave 
only a little piece projecting. 

The Amazon discharges more water than any other 
river in the world. It drains an area about the size of 
all Europe. Its great yellow flood of waters from hundreds 
of sources discolors the sea for nearly a hundred miles 
from land. Long before the shores of Brazil are visible 
the blue of. the tropical sea has changed into the murky 
brown or yellow that denotes land and the work of a 
great rivers. .The depth of the river is in places one hun- 
dred and twenty feet. Its current moves at a speed of 
two and one-half miles an hour, and the smaller boats 
going upstream hug the bank to avoid it, while those going 
downstream' sail' in midchannel. 

It is extremely hard to realize how flat is the Amazon 
channel for: the last five hundred miles of its course, or 
from the Pa's- de Obispo to its mouth. In this distance 
the river' "f alls" but one eighth of an inch a mile! We 
are accustomed, to think of the Mississippi as having a 
very flat course from Cairo to" the. Gulf, with a grade of 
three or four inches to the mile, but "that is" from twenty- 
four to thirty-two times -as steep as the lower course of 
the Amazon. Two thousand Smiles from its mouth it is 
only thirty-five feet above sea. level. The Amazon has 
the flattest river course in the world. With local excep- 
tions, its largest tributaries, the Madeira and the Negro, 
continue this feature up to the base of the Andes, where 
one may see on the one hand lofty mountains whose 
summits are shrouded in clouds and on the other hand a 
vast flat plain about a thousand feet above the sea and 
yet thirty-five hundred miles distant from it by river. 

Strange as it may seem, the. Amazon and its tributaries 



240 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



for all their flatness have rocky stretches in their courses. 
Five hundred miles from the Amazon's mouth are the 
rocks of Obispo; the islands at the mouth of the Amazon 
are in part rocky, and the Madeira has a line of thirteen 
falls and rapids (Fig. 136) in a stretch over two hundred 

miles long! 
Around them 
a railway has 
been built 
which ends at 
Porto Velho 
and to which 
ocean-going 
ships now sail 
(Fig. 133). 
These condi- 
tions may be 
easily under- 
stood if we 
realize that 
the river does 
not have a 
regular but an 

irregular descent. The figures we have just learned show 
what the average grade is; but long stretches of the river 
are quite flat. They are in fact great lakes connected 
with each other by shorter stretches with relatively 
steep descents. 

The lake-like, flatter portions of the river have very 
irregular and indefinite banks, and exhibit a wilderness of 
land and water. So intricate and complex are the side 
channels that it is often exceedingly difficult to make out 
the main ship channel which the boat is to follow. The side 
channels, called igara pes (or "canoe paths") and paranas 




Fig. 119. A tropical forest on the banks of a trib- 
utary of the Amazon. Every year the river 
rises and overflows the forest for miles 



AMAZONIA:. LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 241 

by the Indians, run for long distances parallel to the 
river and intersect the tributaries so that one may go by 
canoe from Santarem one thousand miles up the Amazon 
without once entering or even sighting the main stream 
(Fig. 120). 

When the rains are heaviest, and the water rises spread- 
ing far and wide over the country, the river becomes still 
more irregular in its course. The flood spreads through 
the forest near by, and turns large portions of the country 
into vast lakes (Fig. 119). When the floods subside the 
river's course becomes more definite. In many places a 
new course is formed, the old one having been partly 
filled with sand and mud. Altogether the river is most 
irregular in its behavior and very uncertain for navigation. 

The main stream of the Amazon is about four thousand 
miles long, or six hundred miles longer than the distance 
from Liverpool to New York. It has fourteen large 
tributaries, each a great river in itself. It offers a means 
for inland navigation for more than twenty thousand 
miles. The source of the river is only sixty miles from 
Lima, near the Pacific coast and close to the silver mines 



SKETCH MAP 
OF THE 

AMAZON 

near the mouth of the 
TAPAJOS 




Fig. 120. The Amazon and the Tapajos 



16 



242 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



of Cerro de Pasco in the little lake of Lauricocha, just 
below the limit of perpetual winter. Thus it is seen 
practically to cross South America from west to east 
at very nearly the widest part ' of the continent. Its 
great length, and the fact that it almost crosses the con- 
tinent, makes it 
one of the greatest 
highways in South 
America. Its many 
tributaries drain 
a vast region that 
produces rubber, 
cacao, and tropi- 
cal woods which 
would be of little 
use to man were it 
not for this great 
natural pathway 
(Figs.iig-andi2i). 
The Forests of 
Mystery. The 
heat and heavy 
rainfall of the Am- 
azon valley unite 
to produce one of 
the few really 
The density and 
In many 




121. Canoe travel in the Amazon Basin. 
Yuracare Indians poling 
canoe upstream 



great tropical forests of the world 
luxuriance of the Brazilian forests pass belief 
places the plants crowd into every space and make such 
a mass of vegetation that only by hewing a way through 
it is it possible to travel. A landing on the banks of the 
river is in many places impossible on account of the wall 
of vegetation that leans in places far out over the edge 
of the stream. This is the most extensive and unbroken 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 243 

tropical forest in the world. One may travel for weeks, 
even months, and find scarcely an acre of ground that is 
not occupied by trees. So thickly do they stand and so 
completely does their foliage shut out the sun that the 
interior of a tropical forest is gloomy and solemn. Every 
plant seems to be crowding its neighbor for light and air 
and room in which to grow. The huge trunks of the 
tallest trees bear aloft a crown of leaves that reach out over 
the tops of all the other plants. But about the tall 
trunks are wound the stems of plants called parasites and 
epiphytes that get their food from the trees or live on 
them and use the tree trunks to send their crown of leaves 
to the top of the forest. Below, all is dark; it is toward 
the top of the forest that all the plants are struggling. 
So dark and gloomy is the interior that it is with a 




Fig. 122. Indians and canoe on the Rio Chapare, eastern Bolivia. 

The canoe is of cedar and will carry ten or twelve people. 

The long poles are used in shoving the canoe upstream; 

going downstream, the Indians use 

broad short-bladed paddles 



244 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

sense of relief that one comes out upon the river bank 
or the trail and again looks at sun and sky. It is on the 
side of a trail or on the bank of the stream that one sees 
the real beauty of the tropical forest. Here one may 
find masses of bushes, shrubs, and trees of every height, 
rising one above the other. The brilliant coloring of the 
flowers stands out sharply against the background of 
solid green and gives a charm that is lacking in the dark 
interior. 

Yet it is a mistake to suppose that the tropical forest 
offers charms lovelier than those found in the forests of 
the temperate zone in which we live. Trees of a given 
kind do not stand thickly together. The spaces between 
the trees are so crowded with vines and underbrush 
that there are no beautiful woodland aisles as in our 
forests. There is no carpet of leaves and grass. The 
sunlight is nearly shut out, and one misses the dappled 
effect that beautifies the stately forests of pine, redwood, 
and beech in this country. There may be beautiful 
flowers in the tropical forest, but for every flaming blossom 
to be found there, one as beautiful may be found in our 
fields and pastures. Nor are there open glades where 
the sunlight comes in and gives light to grass and woodland 
flowers. Luxuriant, but overcrowded; dense, but im- 
penetrable; decorated with blossoms along the river 
banks, but with a gloomy interior — these qualities of the 
tropical forest make the traveler glad to return to the 
cool and lovely woods of his northern home. 

In this land of abundant vegetation and of many kinds 
of plants one might suppose it possible at a moment's 
notice to get food enough for a meal. This is by no means 
the case. The forest plants must be improved or new 
plants brought in from outside lands before man finds it 
possible to live here. There are fish in the rivers and 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 245 

wild animals in the forest, but even the Indians require 
vegetable food and almost every tribe has its cultivated 
patches of yuca or manioc from which they wander for a 
limited time only ; and the white man finds that cultiva- 
tion of the soil is absolutely necessary for a prolonged 
stay in the forest. An Indian turned loose in a strange 
part of the forest, and without tools of any sort or bows 
and arrows, would have a hard time finding food enough 
to eat, and indeed he might actually starve in the midst 
of the most abundant vegetation. The reason for this is 
that so few plants in the tropical forest are adapted to 
the needs of man. The corn and the yuca, the rice and 
the oranges, do not grow wild or, if they do, they are not 
the kinds that are good for food. An opening must be 
cleared in the forest, the brush and the trees must be 
burned, useless plants kept out, and man must fight to 
keep useful plants that serve his needs (Figs. 122 and 123.) 

Wild Indian Tribes of the Amazon Basin. Within the 
wide borders of the Amazon Basin there are a great 
many different tribes of Indians with varying customs 
and ways of getting a living. All of them are very sim- 
ple, all eat plain food, and all have rude huts and a 
barbarous speech. All live in tribes held together by 
the loosest bonds — food supply and protection against 
unfriendly neighbors. The rivers supply a portion of 
their food. The land supplies a few game animals, such 
as the monkey, the sloth, and the wild pig or peccary, 
and a few vegetables which require but little cultivation. 

They are all ignorant and without ambition to lift 
themselves above their dreary surroundings. Left to 
themselves they would for centuries to come, if not for- 
ever, remain in the same low state in which they were 
found by the earliest explorers. They have no written 
language and their spoken language consists of a few 



246 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

hundred words only, the names of common objects, such 
as the animals they hunt, the food they eat, and the plains 
and the streams about them. Some are wholly without 
religion, others believe in good and bad spirits, and a good 
many have myths about the creation of the world and 
the manner in which their particular tribe came into it. 



Fig. 123. The Juntas valley, eastern slopes of the Bolivian 
Andes. The mountain slopes produce coca and fruit 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 247 

The Wretched Mura Indians at Matari. It will be 
interesting to look at a few of the wild tribes and see in 
what manner they live, where their food supply comes 
from, and how they differ from their neighbors. First 
of all we shall describe the life of a wild Indian tribe of 
the lower Amazon, the Mura Indians at Matari. A 
village consists of about twenty flimsy mud hovels on 
the edge of a luxuriant forest. There are no cultivated 
trees or plants about, and the whole appearance of the 
place is forlorn and poverty-stricken. The people are 
timid and distrustful and their appearance is not improved 
by the black mud with which their bodies are begrimed 
as a protection against mosquitoes. The children go about 
naked. The women wear petticoats of coarse cloth blotched 
with a dye, called murixi, that is made from the bark of 
a tree. Sometimes necklaces of monkey's teeth are worn. 

Originally these dirty savages lived along the lower 
Madeira and were part of the great Caraio nation that 
consisted of a group of agricultural tribes of far nobler 
character and ways of life. But for centuries they have 
lived in low-lying forest areas often covered with water. 
The miserable land and the wretched surroundings 
have degraded them. Once they lived in well-made 
houses, had gardens, and a knowledge of weaving and 
pottery ; now they are among the lowest tribes of the 
world. They have become a nation of nomadic fisher- 
men, ignorant of agriculture and all the other industries 
known to the people from which they came. 

They live in separate families or small groups, and 
wander from place to place along the banks of rivers and 
the shores of lakes in search of food. At each resting 
place they build rude huts at the edge of the stream on 
which they live for a short time. Their canoes were once 
made of the bark of a tree bound into shape by vines, but 



248 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

these are now rarely seen. Their food is chiefly fish and 
turtles, which they shoot skillfully with bows and arrows. 
Fish is to these people what the seal is to the people of 
Greenland. Their only method of cooking is by roasting, 
and as a general rule their only vegetable foods are bananas 
and wild fruits. The filth, poverty, and deep savagery 
of the Muras afford a remarkable example of the effect of 
the swampy lands in which they maintain a miserable 
existence. 

The Yuracare Indians of Eastern Bolivia. Along the 
banks of the Rio Chapare in eastern Bolivia may be 
found the savage Yuracare Indians who build their huts 
chiefly on the banks of the rivers, creeks, and bayous 
that thread the low-lying lands in which they dwell. 
(Figs. 121 and 124). Sometimes a hut or group of huts 
is built some distance away from the river at the end of 
a narrow trail, so well concealed that it can be seen only 
by trained eyes. These huts are made of strong wooden 
posts supporting a thatched roof and generally have only 
one wall. Laid out under the roof and upon the beams 
are bows and arrows, paddles, and a few skins. In 
these huts the Indians sleep, and cook either in iron 
kettles obtained from traders or by roasting over a fire. 
Usually there are a few cultivated garden patches about, 
containing corn and yuca, the latter being a root or tuber 
somewhat like the yam, but with a mealy structure and 
almost without taste. 

The food of the garden is only a part of their living, 
however. They hunt in the forests with bow, arrow, and 
knife. They are very fond of the monkey, and the wild 
pig or peccary. They also catch fish, of which there are 
many fine varieties in the streams. These they shoot 
with great skill, for from childhood the men have been 
taught the use of the bow and arrow. 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 249 



A traveler once engaged- several Indians and Indian 
boys to run his canoe, and once a day they stopped in 
some quiet, shallow stretch of the river to fish. Often 
they shot five or six 
in quick succession, 
but some of the fish 
were so large that 
they swam off with 
the arrow, dived 
and rose again, and 
darted this way 
and that, only to 
die at last and float 
on the surface. 
When enough fish 
had been caught the 
canoe was drawn 
up on the bank, a 
fire started, and the 
fish roasted. After 
the meal was fin- 
ished the Indians 




Fig. 124. A Bolivian Indian shooting fish 
with bow and arrow from his canoe 
in the Rio Chapare 



took the oily pieces that were left and greased their faces, 
legs, and arms to prevent the mosquitoes from biting 
them. 

The Indian canoes are made of logs of cedar which are 
hollowed out with fire, stone, and steel. These are often 
of great size. Fig. 122 shows one thirty feet long and 
three feet wide that will hold a dozen men. The canoes 
are paddled by long-handled and short-bladed paddles 
operated with a short, jerky stroke. Going upstream 
against the current they use paddles only in the quieter 
water. Where the current is swift they tow the canoe 
with strands of tough bark cut from one of the forest 



250 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

trees. Whenever in traveling along the river they 
become hungry, they run the canoe into the bank, start 




Fig. 125. The kind of house used by the valley and plains people 

of eastern Bolivia. It is almost all roof to protect the people 

from the rains that fall almost every day 

a tire, and roast some fish and yuca. The sand bars 
along the rivers contain many remains of such camp 
fires and rude shelters of bark and leaves occupied at 
night. These are also used by traders and other travelers, 
who find the sand bars dry and usually with enough 
sun-dried wood for a camp fire. 

The Yuracares obtain cotton cloth from passing 
traders, but their clothing is still made largely from the 
inner bark of trees which, by drying and pounding, is 
made into a kind of coarse- textured garment that looks 
like a long shirt. They are exposed to the attacks of the 
countless mosquitoes that swarm out of the river swamps 
at sunset, and their bare arms and legs are often cruelly 
bitten and swollen. They decorate their faces with a 
red ochre, daubing the paint over it in long streaks and 
dots. Their life seems hard and cheerless, but we must 



AMAZONIA: LAND OP FORESTS AND RIVERS 251 

remember that they have never known any other life 
than this and therefore regard their home in the same 
contented way in which we regard ours. 

Indian Slaves in the Rubber Forests. Many Indian 
tribes of the Amazon Basin, and indeed of many other 
places in South America, are held by the whites in a kind 
of slavery. In Amazonia this is not called slavery but 
"peonage," though it would take a great deal of study to 
enable one to see any difference between the two. It is 
a cruel and wicked system and ought to be abolished by 
law. Whole tribes may be captured and taken long 
distances in canoes to the places where they are to be 
set to work in the rubber districts or on the cacao planta- 
tions. There they are given a set of tools with which to 
work, clothes to wear, and a shed in which to sleep. These 
articles are all charged against them at ridiculously high 
prices, and the Indian, who does not wish to buy the 
articles in the first place, is said to be in debt to the 
man who "sold" them to him, the man who is practically 
his owner or master. Now it is a law of the land that 
if an Indian is in debt to a white man he must work for 
him until the debt is paid. If, during the time that he is 
working off the debt, he tries to run away, or does not 
work when he is told to, he may be flogged by an ofhcer 
of the town to whom the owner makes complaint. In 
this way an Indian is often whipped for not working to 
pay for something he was obliged to take. 

The slave owner always sees to it that his Indian rubber 
gatherers never get out of debt. This he does by crediting 
them with very little pay for their work and charging 
them very much for the poor clothing, food, and tools 
that he supplies. If the owner of a slave wishes to sell 
him, he does so for the amount that the Indian is in 
debt to him. It is altogether a shameful practice and is 



252 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

feebly excused by the men who engage in it by saying 
that the Indian is lazy and will not work, even if you 
pay him well; that there is a great deal of work to be 
done and the Indian is the only laborer to be found; 
that if rubber and , cacao are produced the Indian must 
produce them; and if the Indian will not produce them 
for pay, he must be made to work even if he must be 
treated like a slave. 

The lack of labor in the Amazon Basin is one of its 
chief defects. Along some of the tributaries of the Rio 
Negro there are rubber forests which are of great value, 
but in which there is a total absence of people. Foreign 
labor cannot be introduced because it is very expensive 
and few men can be persuaded to make their homes in 
so unhealthful a lowland. Either the rubber and cacao 
of the Amazon valley must in large part and for a long 
time to come remain untouched or a system of slavery, 
such as at present is found there, must be maintained. 
There is a third possibility, and one for which the world 
is waiting with great interest: we may soon discover 




Fig. 126. Santa Rosa, Bolivia, one of the eastern towns at the head- 
waters of a plains stream. To Santa Rosa come boatloads 
of rubber from the plains and caravans of merchandise 
from the highlands 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 253 

means for preventing those dreadful diseases that make 
portions of the tropics so dangerous for the white man. 
Malaria and yellow fever are now in part subdued, but 
bubonic plague, beriberi, and a few other diseases still 
remain frightful scourges of the Amazonian lowlands. 
No large number of white laborers will ever be found 
there unless tropical diseases are conquered and life made 
safer than now. The white men who go into the region 
to-day do so, in the main, as officials, rubber agents, 
adventurers, or outlaws. Rubber collecting has until 
recently been the most profitable occupation of the basin, 
and huge profits were formerly made in a short time. 
The competition of the rubber plantations of India and 
the East Indies has lowered the price of rubber to less 
than half its former level, and the Amazon rubber industry 
is rapidly losing in importance. 

Humboldt's Dream of Great Cities on the Amazon. 
When the great explorer Humboldt visited the Amazon 
valley early in the nineteenth century the region was 
almost unknown to the civilized world and its resources 
were almost untouched. Humboldt dreamed of the day 
when there would be a large population in the valley, 
teeming cities, and great industries. But his dream 
has not been realized and will not be for many years to 
come, probably never, unless man finds some way to 
conquer tropical diseases, the weakening effects of great 
heat, and the torment of insects that makes life so trou- 
blesome. Until then we shall have the scattered tribes 
we now find there, tribes that cling to the river banks and 
to whom the river is the only highway from place to 
place, the source of part of their food, and the sole relief 
from the gloom of the dense forest (Figs. 125 and 126). 

The people who dwell in Amazonia are not scattered 
broadcast over a vast area. They live as a rule in small 



254 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

bands on the banks of the streams or, for the sake of 
protection, in isolated settlements near the river (Fig. 127). 




Fig. 127. Village on Javary River 

Along many of the rivers one may find fewer people 
than there are miles of stream. On some of the main 
rivers there are small towns and villages every few miles, 
and near the mouth of the Negro one comes with surprise 
upon Manaos — a large city in the center of a tropical 
forest (Fig. 128). 

A Modern City in the Heart of the Amazon Valley. 
It was the slave raids in which the whites captured 
Indians for service on the plantations and rubber districts 
of the lower Amazon that gave rise to Manaos. The 
Paulistas, half-breed slave raiders from Sao Paulo, con- 
ducted raiding expeditions in the upper Amazon waters 
and built there an outpost to protect their base of opera- 
tions and keep up traffic with the planters to whom they 
sold the kidnaped people. In this way a city grew up 
which was named Manaos after a now extinct Indian 
tribe, once the head of a great nation of Indians. 

To-day the river port of Manaos is a thriving place of 
more than fifty thousand people, enjoying cable connec- 
tion with the outside world (Figs. 128 and 129). Rubber 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 255 

in large quantities is brought from far and wide. It is 
floated down all the rivers in launches, batelaos (Fig. 130), 
and canoes. Here are gathered the cacao and hides, 
the dyewoods and the tropical woods that are shipped to 
the United States and to Europe. It is here, too, that the 
manufactured goods come which are distributed through 
a large part of Amazonia by the traders and rubber 
gatherers. With the growth in numbers of steam vessels 
of light draft on the tributaries of the Amazon, and with 
the slow increase of river population, Manaos is likely to 
become a much larger city than it is at present. 

The Land of Rubber. The great business of the 
Amazon valley, or Amazonia as it is often called, is the 
gathering, the curing, and the sale of rubber. In few 
other places in the world can one find the people so 
generally engaged in the rubber industry as here. It 
will be worth while, therefore, to see under what condi- 
tions the rubber tree grows and how the industry is 
carried on. On the river plains certain kinds of rubber 
trees thrive on low islands and flood plains submerged 
for several months each year. Ground that is covered 
with water most of the year or ground that is never 
flooded is not suitable for these species. At least some 
of the young rubber plants seem to require shade and still 




Fig. 128. General view of the port of Manaos, Rio Negro, Amazon 

Basin 



256 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

air. Other species of rubber trees grow on higher ground 
at a distance from the river where floods never reach or 




Fig, 129. Mandos market, on the Rio Negro, Amazon Basin 

on the lower slopes of the mountains along the western 
border of the Amazon basin. The best rubber districts, 
however, are found in low country along or near the 
rivers (Plate XI). 

The peons or slaves employed in the rubber industry 
are given from seventy-five to one hundred and fifty 
trees apiece, and these they must visit daily during the 
gathering season. The rubber collector uses a long knife 
called a machete to cut a path through the dense under- 
growth to each tree that he wishes to tap. At times he 
is knee-deep in mud or up to his waist in water. As soon 
as he reaches a rubber tree he chips away the rough parts 
of the bark, so as to make a smooth plaCe for a cup, and 
then with his ax cuts a small gash. Another and another 
is made, until there is a line of them girdling the tree. 
Into each gash he inserts a tin cup or with a small piece 
of clay fastens the cup underneath the gash in the tree. 
On the next day the gashes in the trees are made a little 
lower down and the cups are also set lower. Some 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 257 

collectors tap the trees in the morning and gather the sap 
in the evening, while others gash the trees in the evening 
and gather the sap in the morning (Fig 131.) A good 
collector on the lower Amazon gathers about seven pounds 
daily; in the upper Amazon several times this amount 
may be collected. 

The half -liquid substance that drips into the tin cups is 
poured into a light gourd which holds the contents of five 
hundred to seven hundred cups. After the drippings of 
several days have been gathered into a clay bowl, the 
rubber collector lights a fire in his hut or in the open, 
places a clay funnel over it, pours a thin coating of latex 
or "milk" over a paddle, and holds it in the smoke to 
thicken and "cure." As soon as this is done he again 
covers the paddle (with the first layer of cured sap still 
on it) with fresh sap and smokes or cures this in turn. 
When he has in this way cured a ball of sap as large as 
can readily be held and turned in the smoke, he slits the 
whole mass down the side and so releases the paddle. 
The fuel generally used in the curing of rubber is the 




Courtesy of the Pan-Ameri.-an Uni 

Fig. 130. Bolivian rubber unloaded from batelajs for shipment 
by railway 

17 



258 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

nut of the cerbain, a kind of palm. This is more easily 
gathered and carried to the places where it is used than 




courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 131. Rubber gatherer's home on the upper Amazon River 

any other fuel, gives out a continuous dense smoke, and 
seems to give a better quality to the rubber than any- 
thing else that has ever been tried. The wood of certain 
kinds of palm trees is also employed where the nuts are 
difficult to collect. 

After a season's crop of rubber has been gathered it is 
sent to the great gathering centers: San Antonio, Manaos, 
Para (Fig. 134), and other river towns (Fig. 126). It is 
shipped in canoes, of the sort described on page 249, or 
in batelaos, or steam launches. The batelao (Fig. 132) is 
a sort of barge operated with poles and paddles and able 
to carry from a few hundred pounds to several tons. One 
end of it is often covered with a sort of roof or awning 
of grass and poles of bamboo, as a shelter from the hot 
sun. The batelaos are strongly built to withstand the 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 259 

hard usage to which they are subjected on the trip to the 
rubber port. This is especially true of those employed on 
the Madeira and its branches, for a long line of falls and 
rapids occurs between a point above the junction of the 
Beni and the Mamore and the village of Porto Velho 
(Figs. 133 and 136). 

The Commerce in Rubber. In the past fifteen years 
rubber has become a very precious substance — one of 
the most important articles in the world's markets — and 
has been made to serve man in almost countless ways. 
Rubbers, coats, bicycle tires, and especially automobile 
tires are only a few of the many purposes for which man 
finds the rubber best suited. Thousands upon thousands 
of men are engaged in gathering it and taking it from 
plantation to market. Add to this the fact that half 
the world's rubber is produced in the Amazon Basin and 
one may get some idea of what rubber means to the 
people who live in Amazonia. We may think of every 
other rubber tire, every other rubber storm-proof coat, 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 132. Hauling a batelao across the falls of the Madeira, 
Brazil 



260 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



every other overshoe that we see, as having been made 
out of rubber that came from the Amazon Basin, —rubber 
gathered by Indian peons, smoked over palm nuts, pad- 
dled down rivers that thread the tropical forests, and then 
taken over a long ocean route to the great ports of the 
world. With the recent great- increase in the use and 
therefore in the demand and the price of rubber, the 
Amazon Basin has been scoured for trees that will pro- 
duce it and for men to tap the trees and collect the latex. 
Many formerly unheard-of villages in the depths of the 
vast Amazonian forest have become known because of 
their relation to the rubber industry, and some of them 
have grown to be towns of considerable size and impor- 
tance. Manaos and San Antonio have long been known; 
but Riberalta, Iquitos (Fig. 135), Trinidad, and Acre are 
places that have come into prominence only within recent 
years. This is true of Iquitos especially. Only a few 
years ago it kept up a feeble trade in the upper Amazon 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 133. Madeira- Mamore Railroad and Porto Velho, Brazil 



AMAZONIA: LAND OP FORESTS AND RIVERS 261 

valley by means of the paddle and the dugout canoe. 
Almost nothing of value was exported. It was one of 




Fig. 134. Boat landing at Para 

the remote and unimportant villages in the heart of a 
vast forest. Now Iquitos is an important river port. 
The growth of the rubber industry has changed it com- 
pletely. There is a regular monthly steamship service 
to Liverpool and also to New York. Almost the entire 
outgoing cargo of these steamships is rubber. More 
than half the people of the city depend upon rubber for 
a living. With the growth of the rubber business at 
Iquitos a better means of gathering it had to be found. 
The dugout canoes were too slow and uncertain. Steam 
launches were tried in their place and found to work so 
well that now one may find them on almost every large 
tributary of the Amazon. They are owned chiefly by 
the merchants of the town, whose "clients," to whom 
they loan provisions and supplies, steam away to the 



262 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

rubber district in which they have bought the gathering 
rights, collect a load of rubber, return to Iquitos, and pay 
for their provisions with rubber. 

The steam launch, however, has not entirely driven 
out the use of the canoe. There are still thousands of 
rubber gatherers, and many thousands more of wild 
Indians, to whom the canoe is the only means of going 
from place to place (Fig. 121). The forest is so vast, the 
spaces between the streams so wide, and the trails so few 
and so short that the rivers are still the great and almost 




Fig. 135. Iquitos, Peru, at head of steamer navigation on the Amazon 

the only highways. And where the launch cannot be 
afforded the canoe is the only means of river transport 
besides the batelao. Many rubber gatherers still use it, 
and almost all operate on the same system that prevails 
at Iquitos, getting their supplies on credit and paying for 
the supplies in crude rubber. Rubber is the currency, 
so to speak, of the Amazon valley. If a physician can be 
found to set a broken arm or leg, he is paid in rubber; if 
a man buys a boat or some rice or a mule, he pays for it 
in rubber. Amazonia is truly the land of rubber. 

While the rubber industry has brought fortunes to 
many and a livelihood to thousands of others it has not 
been a blessing to all the men engaged in it. To the 
poor Indian peon or slave who must gather rubber against 
his will it is a curse. Likewise many a man has gone 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 263 

into the great forests to buy rubber and make a fortune 
in a short time, and has died in the wilderness where 
fever overtook him. It is a business full of danger to a 
white man, especially to a man of bad habits. Those 
who lead clean and regular lives have a fair chance of 
outliving its dangers, but even some of the strongest and 
the best fail to return from the forest. 

The rubber industry has also been a misfortune in those 
places where the people have abandoned every other 
kind of regular work for the uncertain business of mak- 
ing money out of rubber. Settlements that were once 
thriving have now fallen into decay. Gathering rubber 
was easier for the enterprising man than hoeing on a 
plantation. By going into the forest with a band of 
Indian peons enough gum could be secured in three 
months to give him an idle living the rest of the year. 
Many substances formerly shipped from Amazonia are 
no longer produced. Cacao, cotton, rice, and sugar were in 
many places produced in larger quantities before the craze 
for rubber began and men drifted off into the rubber dis- 
tricts; the wilderness again claims many a cleared place 
once subdued at great labor. 

If the people of a region spend all their time in produc- 
ing but one substance, all the other articles they use must 
be brought in from other places, and if these are far away 
the cost will be correspondingly great. Think of a region 
where rubber is the chief product of the people and yet 
where a rubber coat manufactured in Europe or the 
United States is so expensive a luxury that but few people 
can afford it! It is the same with many other articles 
needed here. There are no manufactures in Amazonia. 
All the cloth, shoes, tools, sugar, and rice are brought in 
to the rubber districts from foreign countries in the 
northern hemisphere or from distant parts of Peru, 



264 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Bolivia, and Brazil. All of them are therefore very- 
expensive, though it must be remembered that on account 
of the lack of manufacturing facilities such as coal, 
labor, and railroads, they would be still more expensive 
if manufactured under present conditions in Amazonia. 
Salt, which is so cheap in the United States that one 
may often buy a barrel of it for about a dollar, sells in 
parts of Amazonia for thirty cents a pound, or thirty 
dollars a barrel. It is gathered on the vast salars of cen- 
tral Bolivia, taken by llama caravan to Cochabamba, and 
thence by mule train a week's difficult journey to Santa 
Rosa at the head of canoe navigation on the Rio 
Chapare. Though gathered free it sells at Santa Rosa for 
fifteen cents a pound, for it is carried at great labor and 
expense. Not the original cost but the cost of carrying 
the goods causes the extremely high price. From Santa 
Rosa it is shipped in canoes and batelaos down river to 
Trinidad, Villa Bella, Riberalta, and other river towns, 
where it sells for much more on account of the long and 
expensive river journey. 

The Madeira cataracts are formed where the river 
crosses at right angles a number of low, narrow ridges of 
rock, harder than the bands of rock on either side. At 
one time the harder rocks gave rise to mountains but by 
long-continued erosion these have been reduced to mere 
ridges. All of the southern tributaries of the Amazon 
that flow northward off the uplands of southern Brazil 
(Plate VIII) and eastern Bolivia have similar cataracts 
where they cross the edges of the upland or its outlying 
spurs and ridges. The Canuma, the Tocantins, the Tapa- 
jos, and the Xingu are alike in this respect. These barriers 
are of unusual importance since in a forested region the 
rivers are the highways and a river with cataracts is even 
worse than a deeply gullied road blocked by fallen trees. 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 265 



SKETCH-MAP OF THE Aroja, Santo Antonioj 

CATARACTS oflhe RIO MADEIRA. 

and the adjoining portions of the 

BEN! and MAMORE 

Scale of Miles 



Most of the trade of the Amazon Basin centers at 
Para, a city of one hundred thousand people at the mouth 
of the Amazon, eighty miles from the ocean (Figs. 134 and 
137). The city occupies a position of importance since it 
is in touch with all of the great valley behind it. In the 
harbor are all kinds of 
craft from hundreds of 
different places. Here 
is an English cargo 
steamer loaded with 
rubber from Iquitos 
and bound for Liver- 
pool. Yonder lies a 
great steamship from 
New York bringing a 
load of northern lum- 
ber, fish, hardware, 
clothing, salt, and oil 
for the people of Para 
and for the rubber 
men along the various 
rivers. Some butter 
and fish come from 
Norway; rice, flour, 
and fish come from 




Guajara-merim 
Guajara-guacu 



Fig. 136. Map of falls of the Madeira 



the United States, and sugar, coffee, and manioc from 
eastern Brazil. 

Besides the big steamers that cross the ocean there are 
at Para many kinds of boats from the different tributaries 
of the Amazon. Here are canoes and sailboats full of 
vegetables and fruit for the thousands of city dwellers; 
launches and side-wheel steamers from up the Amazon 
bringing rubber and cacao; and covered batelaos from 
the Para estuary and the Tocantins (Fig. 138), bringing 



266 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



down the tropical woods and fruits of the lower part of that 
valley. The people who run the boats are of many kinds, 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Ui 



Fig. 137. Municipal Theater, Para, near the mouth of the Amazon 

from swarthy Indians and black negroes to sickly looking 
whites. It is as if the whole world had been drawn upon 
to make a medley of voices in many languages and a 
mixture of racial types. 

Within the city of Para are many curious and interesting 
articles of food scattered upon the floors or displayed in 
the shop windows. Bananas are piled everywhere and 
are very cheap. There is also the nutritious manioc sold 
as flour,— the food of large numbers of people. We are 
acquainted with it in another form, for it is from this 
substance that we get our tapioca. Quantities of black 
tobacco may be seen rolled up in long twists as big 
around as one's arm. A common food is the turtle. 
Many of those caught for the market are several feet 
across and a foot high. They have their breeding places 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 267 



along the banks of the rivers and the shore (Fig. 139). 
The eggs are about as large as ordinary hens' eggs and have 
thick, leathery skins instead of shells. Each turtle lays 
more than a hundred, and many thousands are often found 
in a single breeding place. The people not only relish the 
turtle itself but also prize the eggs. They search the 
shore for them, dig them out of the sand bars in which 
they are buried, and make turtle oil or turtle butter out 
of them. 

After Para we shall leave the Amazon Basin. In spite 
of the heat, the disease, and the dirty natives with which 
the traveler has constantly to deal, Amazonia has many 
attractions. It is a land of mystery in spite of all the 
boats and the men in various parts of it. One after 
another the early explorers were tempted into this great 
wilderness to explore its forests and to penetrate its 
mysteries. Fable olaced somewhere in its gloomy 
depths the mystic city of El Dorado, the city of gold, 
surrounded by fairy lakes and filled with gilded palaces. 
As men traveled along its great water courses the fabled 
city of gold flitted from one corner of the wilderness 




Fig. 138. Village of Tocantins, Amazon Basin 



268 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



to another and at last disappeared, though the history 
of the search for it will long be of absorbing interest. 



1 


dSmm 






Mr 


¥ 1 












:...,.,_. :ir^ : ;.:,...*i; : f««s 




$*.?■ 




- iit :■ '3* 


: 



Fig. 139. Loading turtles, Amazon Basin 

One by one the secrets of the region have been dis- 
covered. Humboldt explored parts of it early in the 
nineteenth century, Herndon and Gibbon of the United 
States navy traversed it by different routes in 1851-1852, 
and Louis Agassiz studied the natural history of the 
lower Amazon in 186 5-1 866. Crevaux, the Stanley of 
South America, penetrated some of its remotest regions. 
Wallace, the great naturalist, unlocked the secrets of the 
Rio Negro. Keller wrote of the Indian tribes of the 
Madeira basin and of the difficult cataracts. Colonel 
Church (American) and Sir Clements Markham (English- 
man) crossed the basin and gave us graphic accounts of 
the great rivers, the plants, and the wild Indian tribes. 
In later years launches and steamers have multiplied 
on all the large tributaries as well as on the main river, 



AMAZONIA: LAND OF FORESTS AND RIVERS 269 

and the number of people who have visited the Amazon 
is now large. It no longer is a hazardous undertaking 
merely to cross the basin along the best routes, though 
to live and to work in it for years still involves risk of sick- 
ness or at least of poor health brought on by insect pests, 
bad food and water, and almost constant high tempera- 
ture and humidity. 

The latest expeditions to the Amazon country have 
shown how little we yet know of some of the corners of 
this vast wilderness. The anthropologist, Farrabee, has 
just explored the northeastern section — the hinterland of 
Guiana. Colonel Rondon of Brazil has traveled through 
new regions in the northern parts of Matto Grosso and 
Goyaz; and during 19 12 Colonel Roosevelt, in company 
with Rondon, entered the Amazon Basin from the head- 
waters of the Paraguay by a new route. He discovered 
the course of a river, about eight hundred miles long — the 
so-called "River of Doubt," since named by the Brazilian 
government "Rio Theodoro" in his honor. The fasci- 
nating story of his adventures is illustrated by striking 
photographs of forest scenes, Indian hunters, game, and 
strange, isolated settlements in a hitherto unknown part 
of South America. 



CHAPTER XIV 
ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 

The Great Volcanoes. As its name indicates, Ecuador 
is the land of the equator; it also has the distinction of 
containing more volcanoes for its size than any other 
country on the continent. The land is very irregular 
owing to the large amount of volcanic material poured out 
upon the surface everywhere and to the manner in which 
the volcanoes themselves are placed. Upon the central 
plateau there is an "avenue of volcanoes" in which are 
still active craters that at intervals emit mud and lava 
and destroy hundreds of people who dwell in the valleys 
at their feet. 

There have been also destructive earthquakes, as in 
1868, when whole towns and villages were destroyed and 
fifty thousand people lost their lives. If these mountains 
are beautiful they are also dangerous, and one cannot 
admire them without remembering the terrible effects of 
their wrath. 

Cotopaxi is one of this great group of volcanoes and 
in 1880 was climbed for the first time by Whymper, who 
has written a stirring account of its active crater. 
"Cavernous recesses belched forth smoke, the sides of 
the cracks and chasms no more than halfway down shone 
with ruddy light, and so it continued right down to the 
bottom . . . [where] was a ruddy circular spot about 
one-tenth of the diameter of the crater, the pipe of the 
volcano, its channel of communication with lower regions, 
filled with incandescent if not molten lava, glowing 
and burning, with flames traveling to and fro over its 
surface, and scintillations scattering as from a wood fire, 

270 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 271 

lighted by tongues of flame which issued from the cracks 
in the surrounding slopes." 

Among these giant volcanoes there is none other that 
lifts its head so high as lofty Chimborazo (Fig. 140). It 
reaches more than twenty thousand feet above the sea and 
on clear days may' be seen from Guayaquil, a city on the 
hot, steaming low lands of the western coast. To travel 
from Guayaquil to the top of Chimborazo is to pass through 
as many different climates as one would experience in 
going from Guayaquil to the north pole, for the crater of 
Chimborazo is ice-capped in spite of the eternal fires that 
smoulder in the heart of the volcano. Within the past 
few hundred years Chimborazo has broken out many times. 

The Unknown Borders. Ecuador is not only one of 
the smallest republics of South America; it is also the 
only country whose size varies so much from year to year, 
according to the claims of its neighbors, Colombia and 
Peru, that in the end it may be twice as large or only 
half as large as its people think it is (Plate II). As a 




Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Fig. 140. Snow-capped mountain, Chimborazo, Ecuador, within 
sight of a hot lowland 



272 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

matter of fact its exact size is of small consequence, for 
the land it holds in dispute with these neighbors is located 
east of the mountains and within the hot, forest-clad basin 
of the Amazon, and has little present value. Some rubber 
is gathered on the eastern lowlands, but the amount is 
not large enough to cause Ecuador to take a very fir in 
stand against her neighbors in holding the land. Like 




Fig, 141. 



Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Old Spanish church, La Compania, Quito, Ecuador 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 273 

some other South Ameriean countries, Ecuador once in 
a while amuses the world by publishing a map of the 
country with boundaries that take in as generous slices of 
neighboring states as the humor of the map maker may 
lead him to include. If one compare an official map of 
Ecuador with a map of Ecuador published in Peru or 
Colombia, an astonishing difference will be seen. 

The White People of Ecuador. Although Ecuador is 
a separate republic and has a government of its own it is 
almost amusing to learn how small a number of white 
people actually live in it and do its business. There are 
only as many white people in Ecuador as live in Louis- 
ville, Kentucky, that is, about two hundred and thirty 
thousand. Among even this number there are some 
who have a small amount of negro or Indian blood. 
Including Indians, negroes, and half-breeds there are in 
all Ecuador to-day perhaps a million and a half, about 
twice as many as live in the city of St. Louis (Plate XII). 

The Indians of Ecuador. The Indians of Ecuador 
belong to two distinct groups. Upon the western plateau 
and in the higher valleys are the salt-eating and semi- 
Christian Indians who live chiefly by agriculture, are 
peaceful and industrious, and have a settled mode of 
life. Then there are the really wild tribes that eat no 
salt, have no religion or a very simple one, live in a 
savage way, recognize no man's authority, and are 
treacherous and warlike. These live upon the plains 
of the eastern part of the country, the forested western 
edge of the great Amazon Basin. As the forest-dwelling 
Indians form so large a part of the total population of 
Ecuador it will be worth our while to look at their cus- 
toms in some detail. Their wild life makes them in 
some respects the most interesting: of all the native people 
of Ecuador. 
18 



274 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The flat, forested country of the Napo valley contains 
many Indian tribes. This river, one of the tributaries 
of the upper Amazon in Ecuador, flows through a flat 
country and winds back and forth in large and regular 
curves. Upon the outside of the river bends the banks 
are being cut away, while the inside of each bend is 
marked by a flat sand bar containing driftwood, a splendid 
camp site for Indian hunters, white traders, and travelers 
alike. For miles the country is a network of water courses, 
and each side of the river is bordered by a countless 
number of lakes opening into the main stream by sluggish 
channels. 

The Napo country is in some places particularly wild 
and desolate and full of animals. The tall cane bordering 
the banks of the river is the hiding place of pumas, jaguars, 
and wild hogs that come down to the river at night to 
drink. On the lower Napo turtles and turtle eggs are the 
main articles of food, as monkeys are in the upper Napo. 

The Wild Tribes of the Napo Valley. The Zaparo 
tribe of the Napo valley is one of the wild tribes, whose 
customs, clothing, and means of securing food are of 
special interest. These Indians lead a semi-nomadic 
life, sometimes collecting at their settlements and again 
following the trails of the wild animals that move now 
in this direction, now in that, according to the manner in 
which the food ripens. When they reach a place where 
the hunting is good they build beautiful sheds, open on 
all sides, with several palm-fiber hammocks slung crosswise 
within. These serve them only a few months at the long- 
est, for the game soon becomes scarce as the hunters scour 
the forest roundabout, and abandoning the old camp site 
they move to a new one. 

The Zaparo Indians have no industry whatever except 
the making of the hammocks in which they sleep and the 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 275 

weaving of the fishing nets so necessary for their food 
supply. The only covering, worn by men and women 
alike, is a long bark shirt, made in a single piece, and 
called a llanchama. To make it, a moderate-sized tree 
of the right kind is cut down and the bark pounded with 
clubs until it is broken off and the interior fibrous bark 
loosened from the wood. This inner bark is thin and 
forms a good natural cloth. It is removed from the trunk 
of the tree without being cut so that it is in a single piece 
and need be only partially closed at one end, and have 
two armholes cut into it. Before the garment is worn 
it is dried in the sun and ornamented by circles and 
other designs in red, without which it would not be 
thought complete. 

The Deadly Blow-gun. Some of the Indians of the 
Napo valley make the blow-gun, an instrument used by 
only a few tribes in the world and dreaded by all their 
enemies. It is as formidable to the white man with his 
modern high-power rifle as to the ignorant savage, for 
it is both deadly and silent. Not a sound may be heard 
to indicate whence come the deadly arrows so skillfully 
blown by some Indian hidden in dense brush or bamboo. 
The gun, about eight feet long, is made of straight bamboo. 
A joint of bamboo serves as a quiver; the arrow is a 
slender stick almost a foot long, with a very sharp point 
dipped in poison that soon paralyzes its victim. The 
end of the arrow next the mouth is wrapped with light, 
delicate wild cotton. In shooting the blow-gun the 
mouthpiece is held in both hands. It is blown with 
astonishing skill and has great penetration at short 
distances. 

An American Sewing Machine in an Indian Hut. It is 
a strange and curious sight to see an almost nude Indian 
woman using a sewing machine in making calico dresses 



276 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

for her children; yet it is a sight frequently seen in the 
lower parts of the Napo valley. Traders have brought 
in many of the white man's goods, but none that seems 
more strangely out of place than a sewing machine in the 
hut of a forest Indian. These machines are used even by 
those Indians who eat with their fingers and who squat 
upon the earthen floors of their dirty huts. The women 
take the greatest pride in one, usually those of a whole 
village purchasing a machine in common. The old Napo 
costume of woven grass or bark is in some places fast 
going out of fashion, ordinary dresses of cotton and linen 
being worn in their place. 

The Bleak Paramos of the Highland. What a contrast 
to the life of the plains of eastern Ecuador is the life 
on the mountains and plateaus of western Ecuador ! Here 
are the lofty paramos, or high, bleak, and almost deserted 
plateaus which extend northward into Colombia. The 
heavy mists, the clouds, and the rains of the paramos are 
so penetrating that they cause great discomfort, and it 
sometimes happens that both whites and Indians when 
overtaken by bad weather become numbed and perish. 
Every one attempts to get across a paramo as quickly 
as possible. There is not even a shrub, much less a 
human habitation, to afford food or protection. Every- 
where one feels a sense of great loneliness. With the 
exception of the half -wild cattle one might travel for 
weeks without seeing any large animal. The paramo 
stag, the mountain lion, the bear, the fox, and the woolly- 
haired tapir live there in the scantiest numbers. A few 
lazy vultures and smaller birds add to the desolation. 
"There is a note of sadness running through the whole 
of nature on the paramo, a note so strong that even the 
wild inhabitants seem to have caught it. It is a desolate 
and melancholy land." (Keane.) 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 277 

The Wet Lowlands of the Coast. Upon the western 
edge of Ecuador one finds again the rank vegetation that 
is the mark of tropical heat and seasonal wetness (Plate 
XI). It is this aspect of the country that greets the 
traveler who enters the Gulf of Guayaquil and sails up 
the broad Guayas River. The banks of the stream are 
crowded with trees and shrubs, and everywhere are signs of 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 142. Gliding up into the heart of the country; natives poling 
boat up Babahoyo River, Ecuador 



278 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

regular rains. These rains come during the southern 
summer, that is, during December, January, and February. 
After the first rains the appearance of the country is most 
refreshing. Animal life is abundant, the flat savannas, 
bordering the stream are covered with a bright green 
carpet of grass and shrubs, and the bushes have a rich 
covering of leaves and flowers. During the dry season — 
July and August — the plants lose their leaves in large 
part, and rest until the summer rains come again. 

The plains bordering the largest and the only navigable 
stream of Ecuador are well cultivated and pleasing to 
the eye. "Plantation after plantation, hacienda after 
hacienda, extend along the main stream; every house is 
surrounded by the magnificent fruit trees, bananas, and 
palms. Now we wander for hours through the dark 
green cacao forests, now through low coffee bushes, again 
over bright green fields of rice and sugar cane, or along 
the steep slopes of darker tobacco fields; suddenly we 
find ourselves for a short stretch in dense forest, where the 
monkeys are chattering; then we come upon thousands 
of cattle and horses pasturing on the open savannas. 
These savannas, with their great isolated trees or clumps 
of bamboo grasses, twenty feet high, present a wonderful 
sight." (Wolf.) 

The Panama Hat. It is from the moist lowlands of 
western Ecuador that the chief exports of the country 
are derived. This is the land of palms and fruits, of 
grazing cattle, and plantations of cacao, sugar, and rice. 
It is a land where there is very little manufacturing. 
Almost all that the country produces for export is derived 
from the soil. The only manufactured article is the 
Panama hat, and because it is so famous we shall wish to 
see how it is woven. It may be interesting to know in 
passing that the name " Panama hat" is rather misleading, 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 279 

for it is not made in Panama at all but in Ecuador, 
Colombia, and northern Peru. Some years ago, and al- 
most the same is still true, these hats were shipped chiefly 
by way of the Isthmus of Panama, and it was there that 
for a long time they were bought and sold. But to-day 
it is chiefly at Guayaquil as well as at Payta, in northern 
Peru, that they are brought for sale. In Ecuador Panama 
hats are called Jipijapa after the town and province in 
that country where it is said they were first made. 

The plant that supplies the straw out of which Panama 
hats are made is called planta de Toquilla. It grows wild 
in the low, damp forests and is cultivated oh some of the 
plantations. The ''straw" is obtained from the young 
white leaves that are just beginning to open. The leaves 
have parallel veins and it is along these that they are 
split into shreds resembling straw. They are then boiled 
and dried in the sun. For shipment from place to place 
the straw is packed in bales weighing from sixty-five to 
ninety pounds each, which sell for thirty-five or forty 
cents a pound. 

Many of the hats made in Ecuador are of course very 
plain and are worn by the poorer natives. Those shipped 
out of the country for sale in the United States, Europe, 
and southern South America are as a rule better made. 
The highest grades are of fine fiber and are braided with 
extreme care. Some of them bring the maker from one 
hundred to one hundred and twenty-five dollars apiece. 
This seems like a high price, but we must remember that 
the straw is fine and the weaver must work so slowly 
that from five to six months may be required to weave a 
single hat. Sometimes cigar cases or watch fobs are made 
on commission for a particular price agreed on before the 
work is begun. One such article smaller than one's hand 
is known to have cost five hundred dollars, and to have 



280 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

required several years' time to weave. Its texture 
resembled that of fine cloth. In some provinces the 
making of hats is an important industry in which a large 
number of people are engaged ; in Guayas five hundred to 
a thousand dozen are manufactured every month. Nearly 
a million and a quarter dollars' worth are sent to the 
United States every year. 

Cacao in Ecuador. More than twenty countries of the 
world are engaged in the production of cacao. Of these 
countries the most important are Brazil, the island of Sao 
Thome, and Ecuador (Figs. 5 and 151). In 1904 Ecua- 
dor produced five thousand tons more than its nearest 
competitor, Brazil, but more recently Brazil occupies first 
place. Whole plantations are devoted to the growth 
of cacao so widely used as a drink by the people of tem- 
perate lands. Plantations are bought and sold at the rate 
of fifty to seventy-five cents per tree._ Each tree produces 
about one pound, a pound selling for fifteen or twenty 
cents in Ecuador. Cacao is unlike tea and coffee in that 
it can be grown in only a very narrow zone between six 
hundred fifty and twenty-six hundred feet above the sea, 
and between twenty degrees north and twenty degrees 
south of the equator. 

Ivory from a Plant instead of an Elephant. If one 
were to visit a button factory in the United States he 
Would find there a lot of curiously shaped nuts as hard 
as bone and with a brown surface, but without a shell. 
Break open one of the nuts and there is found within only 
an intensely hard white interior, out of which buttons 
may be made. The nut is called "vegetable ivory" and 
it is obtained from a limited number of countries, among 
them tropical Ecuador, where the gathering and sale of 
it takes the time of many men. It is one of the important 
industries of the country. 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 



281 



Without vegetable ivory, buttons would be either much 
more expensive or inferior in quality, for they would have 
to be made of steel, of the bone and horns of cattle slaugh- 
tered for the meat market, as indeed some buttons are now 
made ; or they would have to be made of wood, and would 
not wear well ; or of ivory, which would be very expensive, 
for it is obtained from the tusks of elephants that live 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, R. Y. 

Fig. 143. Up-country hospitality among the natives; dinner in 
preparation, Riobamba, on the plateau of Ecuador 



282 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

in tropical Africa. There are many other substances 
beside these out of which buttons are made, though almost 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 144. A country housewife grinding oats for bread in a home 
on Ambato-Riobamba road 

all of them are open to one objection or another. But 
here in the land of the equator there grows a plant yielding 
a nut out of which excellent buttons may be made cheaply. 
About three million five hundred thousand pounds of 
vegetable ivory are sent out of Ecuador every year at a 
cost of more than one hundred thousand dollars. In Ecua- 
dor the vegetable ivory nuts are also shipped in some num- 
bers to Quito, the capital city, where they are skillfully 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 



283 



carved into little figures that are then painted in bright 
colors and sold to the people of the country roundabout. 
The Plateau of Ecuador. Between the flat, hot, moist 
plains of eastern Ecuador and the forested western fringe 
in which most of Ecuador's plantations are found, is the 
mountainous part of the country. Here, too, we find the 
high plateaus and valleys in which a great part of the na- 
tives and almost all the whites live (Figs. 143 and 144). 
No white man stays on the coast except to transact 
business, to wait for the next boat, or to see the country. 
A few live on the lowlands all the time, but rather from 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y, 

Fig. 145. Quito, Ecuador, the city of the equator, g,3SO feet above 
the sea, among the Andean volcanoes 



284 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

necessity than from choice, because all of the lowlands and 
the lowland cities are extremely hot and unheal thful, and 
infested by flies and mosquitoes. On the other hand, 
the climate of the plateau is cool and healthful the year 
round; there are farms on which corn and cattle are 
produced, whose owners enjoy a degree of comfort and 
health quite in contrast to the discomfort endured by the 
fever-ridden and insect- tormented people of the plains. 
It is here that we realize the many kinds of climate that 
even such a small tropical country as Ecuador offers to 
its people. Upon either side are hot plains; between 
these are high plateaus and valleys with every kind of 
climate and vegetation; higher still are lofty paramos, 
cold, bleak, wet, and almost lifeless; and crowning the 
whole are superb volcanoes, whose lofty peaks rise into a 
land of eternal winter (Fig. 140 and Plates VIII and XL) 




Fig. 146. 



Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Street in Quito, Ecuador 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 285 

The Cities of the Cool Plateau. Upon the cool and 
pleasant plateau are the chief cities of Ecuador. Here 
is Quito (Figs. 145 and 146), the capital and largest city; 
here also are the large towns, Latacunga, Riobamba, and 
Ambato, each with about ten thousand people, and Cuenca 
in the upper Paute basin with twenty-five thousand. 
Quito is said to have between thirty and eighty thousand 
people, these wide extremes showing how carelessly the 
people are numbered, for no one can say just how large 
any one of these towns actually is. Quito stands more 
than nine thousand feet above the sea, under the shadow 
of the volcano Pichincha, and is laid out in the form of a 
square. Its churches (Fig 141), convents, and cathedral 
have a fine appearance, but are in painful contrast to the 
mean, squalid native houses built almost in their shadow. 
Here are Panama hats from the valleys on the eastern 
slopes of the mountains, oil paintings sold in the country 
districts near by, the skins of birds from the Napo valley, 
grain, cattle, and hides from the plateau, and a little 
silver and gold from the river sands. 

In the quaint old city of Quito one may now see the 
most striking contrasts of old and new. The native 
Indians still follow the old ways of life: build their 
mud-walled houses on the old designs, use the llama to 
some extent, till their farms with the most simple wooden 
plows (Fig. 150), and live in almost every way like the 
Indians of four hundred years ago. 

Until a few years ago Quito, although it is the capital 
and largest city of the entire country, was connected with 
the outside world only by stagecoach and mule caravan. 
All of its imports had to be brought in over trails and 
coach roads in such bad condition that they were closed 
for several months of the year in times of exceptionally 
heavy rains. Now there is a railway to Guayaquil, the 



286 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



chief seaport (Figs. 147. 148, and 149), and the traveler may 
reach the plateau town by steamer and rail in about 




Fig. 14: 



Courtesy of the Pan-American Union 

Street in Guayaquil, Ecuador. Guayaquil is one of 
the most unh'ealthful cities in the world 



twelve days from New York. The railway was built at 
heavy expense and at great risk. In some cases the 
mountain sides had to be faced with retaining walls of 
brick and stone, steel bridges were built across the moun- 
tain torrents that course through the bottoms of steep- 
sided ravines, and switchbacks were built that make the 
ascent of steep slopes possible. The ties are of California 
redwood. All timber except that used for temporary pur- 
poses had to be brought from California and Oregon. 

Sooner or later the fine water power that the mountain 
torrents would supply will be put to use and the trains 
operated by electric power. The lower part of the rail- 
way had to be built by negroes brought in from tropical 
Jamaica because the natives from the plateau sicken and 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 



287 



die in the unhealthful lowlands and could not be induced 
to work on the line until it reached an elevation of six 
thousand feet. The railway means a great deal not only 
to the people of the interior plateau but also to the valley 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood. N. Y. 

Fig. 148. Volunteer firemen ready to run with the engine, Cathedral 
Square, Guayaquil, Ecuador 



288 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



people on the eastern slopes of the Andes, where man 
has long been shut away, far from the sea and the great 




49. Guayaquil, Ecuador. Part of Malecon, showing the 
river front 

currents of the world's trade. The locomotives on the 
line now use wood obtained from near the coast and 
coal imported from Australia and England. 

The Only Seaport of Ecuador. The seaport of Ecuador, 
to which all the goods for the interior of the country must 
be brought, is Guayaquil on the banks of the Guayas 
River. It has an evil name, not only because of the heat 
and flies and swarms of ferocious mosquitoes, but also 
because of the prevalence of disease of almost every kind. 
It is perhaps the most unheal thful city in the world. It 
lacks a decent sewer system, its streets are filthy, its air 
stagnant, and the heat of the sun intense. A large firm 
doing a great business on the west coast of South America 
tried for years to maintain a branch house at Guayaquil, 
but agent after agent died of some one of the diseases 
which have made the city notorious until, at last, the firm 
gave up in despair. Yellow fever is almost always pres- 
ent, varied once in a while by outbreaks of typhoid, 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 



bubonic plague, smallpox, and malaria. From time to 
time the government has tried to do something, but after 
a feeble effort or two allowed the old condition of things 
to return. At last they have organized a commission 
and have put at the head of it Colonel Gorgas, who has 
made a great reputation in both Cuba and Panama for 
cleaning up tropical cities and stamping out disease. 
If the commission is allowed to carry out its plans Guaya- 
quil may become a clean port like Rio de Janeiro and 
Havana (Plate II). 

In spite of the bad climate and evil name of Guayaquil 
a great deal of business is done there, for it is the main 
seaport of the country. Although the river is shallow 
and full of changing sand bars, ocean steamers come well 
up the river, where they are met by barges, steam launches, 




Fig. 150. PI owing with a crooked stick — a custom still found in 
both Ecuador and Peru 

19 



290 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

dugout canoes, and rafts that move between vessel and 
port with the tides. Here, too, are gathered all the 




Courtesy of the Pan-American U 



Fig. 151. Loading cacao at Guayaquil, Ecuador. A typical 
harbor scene 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 291 

products of Ecuador, and one may learn much of the 
country by seeing what the great ocean steamers leave 
or take from it. Here are the cacao, the hides, and 
the cattle of the plains through which the Guayas River 
runs and in whose current the boats are swinging; there 
are the ivory nuts, the Panama hats, the sugar cane, and 
the rice grown on the plantations (Fig. 152) that line the 
river for miles. The houses of Guayaquil are made in 
large part of bamboo and plaster, for the sake of coolness 
and on account of the earthquakes for which the town is 
too well known. Large buildings would endanger the 
lives of the people, but these light structures rarely fall. 
Even when they do fall the danger to life is slight. 

A City on a River. Another interesting town in Ecuador 
is Bodegas, many of whose houses are built far out over 
the water on piles driven into the mud of the river bottom. 
The reasons for this curious condition are the heavy rains 
that occur here and the fact that during the rainy season 
the lowlands near the river are flooded so high that the 
people would be driven out if they built their houses on 
the ground. When the rains come and the water rises 
the people may go into the second stories of their 
houses and live there until the floods subside. The street 
crossings are bridged by logs and the people sometimes 
step from one block to another in going from store to 
store, or even use a canoe as in the city of Venice, 
where canals take the place of streets and every one 
travels by boat. 

Some of the smaller houses of Bodegas consist of one 
room only and are made of poles covered with palm leaves. 
To enter, one must go up a ladder instead of a flight of 
steps; the ladder can be drawn up and let down as the 
water rises and falls, and is not swept away as steps would 
be. The floors are of bamboo canes with cracks between 



292 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



the separate canes — cracks so wide that one may look 
through to the water beneath. This is very handy for 
the women, because the dirt falls through the cracks to 
the river and it is not necessary to sweep the rooms. 

The people of Bodegas, like those in other lowland 
towns, use charcoal for fuel, burning it in braziers, a 
little at a time as they require it for cooking. The rains 
make the poor wood even poorer, and to have a good fire 
good fuel must be used. Charcoal burning, as the 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

Fig. 152. Harvesting sugar cane on a great plantation, a typical 
scene in river valleys of Peru and Ecuador 



ECUADOR: LAND OF VOLCANOES 293 

process of making charcoal is called, is a regular industry 
all the way along the west coast from Mexico past Central 
America and Panama to Ecuador. Farther south there 
are few rains and the people use the dry, resinous, quick- 
burning, and heat-giving desert shrubs for fuel. Charcoal 
sometimes sells for as much as a dollar a hundredweight 
and is at least one article that the native must buy and 
hence for which he must work at some paid task. The 
people of Bodegas live chiefly upon bananas, sweet 
potatoes, and yuca, as well as upon the sugar cane, which 
they eat raw. They also eat rice and dried beef obtained 
from the plantations and the ranches of the Guayas 
valley. 



CHAPTER XV 

LOWLAND AND HIGHLAND PEOPLES OF 
COLOMBIA 

The Caribbean and its Strange Shores. Colombia is 
nearer our shores than any other South American country 
except Venezuela, and yet to most people it is as little 
known as Tierra del Fuego or Spitzbergen. From New 
York one may reach the coast of Colombia in a week. 
Starting in midwinter, the cold intense and the port of 
New York enshrouded with snow and ice, one reaches the 
Gulf Stream in three days and enters a region of summer 
where balmy winds whisper of strange southern lands. 
A few hundred miles farther is the warm Caribbean, 
where one sees for the first time some of the enchantments 
of the tropics. The sun sinks into a golden west barred 
by magically colored clouds, strange stars shine from an 
unfamiliar sky, and the brilliant moonlight gives a 
romantic touch to a wonderful sea. It is as if one were 
living again the stories of the Arabian Nights — as if the 
world were unreal. The intense and indescribable blue of 
the Caribbean is the wonder of all people who travel 
through it. By night the sea at times glows with phos- 
phorescence ; in the daytime it is brilliantly lighted by an 
almost vertical sun. Strange plants float upon its waters, 
strange fish flash through it, strange faces look from the 
shores of its many islands. 

A week's journey through the purple and gold of the 
tropics, and we are in Colombia. In but a few days we 
have been taken from the land of the north to the land 
of the south, from snow and ice to heat and luxuriant 
vegetation. The welcome shore is bordered by waving 
palms; tropical fruits hang from hundreds of trees; 

294 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 



295 



barefooted men and women do the tasks of the port. 
The southland is before us with all its mystery and its 
beauty, its color and abundant life, its new peoples and 
its tropical products (Figs. 153 and 154). 

A Large Country and a Small Map. The republic of 
Colombia is so small on most maps (Plate II) that its 
really great size is often not appreciated until the traveler 
actually reaches it and begins a journey across it. Then it 
is with no little astonishment that he learns its vast area. 
Colombia is twelve times the size of the state of New York 
and more than twice the size of the great state of Texas. 
Its length exceeds the distance from Chicago to the Gulf 
of Mexico; its width is equal to the distance from St. Louis 
to New York. Its coast line is longer than our Atlantic 
coast from New York to Charleston, South Carolina, 




Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y, 

Fig. 153. Group of native washerwomen on the Magdalena River, 
near Barranquilla, Colombia 



296 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Physical Features and Life. If mountains are high 
enough they are a barrier to people; if rivers are not 







,- ™./~ /' ' -J, 





Fig. 154. 



Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

^4 sewing class in a school in Barranquilla, Colombia 



navigable people cannot use them in settling new places 
and in taking their products to market; if a country lies 
in the tropics where the heat at sea level is great it is 
important to know if there is high land where the climate 
is cool and white people can live with some comfort. 
We shall therefore look at the physical features of 
Colombia and see in what respects these favor man and 
in what respects Colombia presents obstacles to man's 
use of the land. 

The Plains of Colombia. Colombia, like so many of 
the South American countries, shares in the vast territory 
of both the Amazon and the Orinoco basins. Almost one 
half of it lies within the region drained by these great 
rivers and their tributaries. What we have learned about 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 297 

the forests and wild Indian tribes, the plains and products 
of the Amazon valley, is as true of southeastern Colombia 
as of Brazil, where most of the Amazon country is 
found. The flat river plains of eastern Colombia are 
the least-known parts of the country to-day. North- 
ward and westward they are separated from the seacoast 
by mountains; on the east it is a month's journey to the 
mouth of the Amazon and the Atlantic and almost as 
long to the mouth of the Orinoco. For many thousands 
of years the mountain streams have been carrying the 
detritus of the high land down to the low land and ac- 
cumulating it there. As a result the plains are very smooth 
— true river plains built up by the age-long work of the 
hundreds of streams that drain the eastern slopes of the 
lofty Andes of Colombia (Plate VIII). 

Few industries of any importance are found on these 
river plains. The region is too far from the great routes 
of trade. It would cost more than chey would be worth 
to market the hides and the mules that the grassy plains 
might produce. Until steamers or launches ply upon 
the eastern streams but little will be produced upon the 
bordering pastures. 

To show how difficult life is upon the grasslands of 
eastern Colombia take the single item of salt, which most 
people would not think of as affecting a country's develop- 
ment. President Reyes, after visiting the region years ago, 
told his people that a cheap supply of salt is necessary to 
the eastern plains before they can be exploited properly. 
Others speak of the eager quest for salt and say that the 
want of it is severely felt in many places. We sometimes 
hear it said that a lazy man is not worth his salt — a say- 
ing that may be literally true in a country where salt is 
so valuable. 

In the coast regions salt is made by the evaporation 



298 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

of sea water that has become very salty through con- 
centration in the lagoons where evaporation is rapid 
owing to the high temperature. In the interior of the 
country are deposits that would yield great quantities 
of salt if they were properly worked. One of the most 
noted of the interior salt mines . is that at Cipaquira, 
about thirty miles north of Bogota, where thousands of 
tons are produced annually and the deposits seem inex- 
haustible. But the supply of salt in the country as a 
whole is still very limited and a great deal of that used 
by the people of Colombia comes from abroad. Both 
the imported salt and that mined in the country is sub- 
jected to a heavy tax, one of the sources of government 
revenue. 

Of great advantage to Colombia in the opening of her 
eastern plains is the boundary treaty with Brazil which 
was signed in 1907. It gives to each country the right 
to navigate the rivers running partly through one country 
and partly through the other. Most of the rivers of 
southeastern Colombia cross over into Brazil and after 
long journeys reach the Amazon. To ship the cattle 
and hides that the future herds of this region will produce, 
to export the rubber, and to send to other countries the 
tropical woods in which the eastern valleys abound, will 
require the free use of the waterways, since these are the 
only means of transportation that exist. Both nations 
also have agreed to improve the rivers on their com- 
mon boundary. 

In contrast to the vast flat spaces of southeastern 
Colombia are the mountains and deep valleys of the west. 
The Andes of Colombia consist of three nearly parallel 
chains running in a north-south direction, the eastern, 
central, and western Cordilleras, Toward the south the 
mountains consist largely of volcanic rock which has been 



PEOPLES OP COLOMBIA 299 

poured out upon the surface in great amounts, in some 
places blocking the courses of rivers and turning them in 
new directions. The summits of a few of the volcanoes 
are so lofty that their tops are covered with perpetual 
snow. In northern Colombia near the shores of the 
Caribbean and standing so near the sea that its white 
summits are visible from the shore is the mountain knot 
called the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Though it 
lies near the great Andean system it is separated from it 
by the deep Cesar valley. 

In the extreme northwestern part of Colombia is still 
another group of mountains, the Cordillera de Choco. 
These are the lowest of all the mountains of Colombia 
and stretch northwestward through Central America, 
here and there crowned by volcanoes some of which still 
throw out steam and lava and at long intervals overwhelm 
cities and plantations, killing many people, and laying 
waste the land. 

From the loftier mountains of Colombia may be seen 
some of the grandest scenery which the country affords. 
The Cerro Munchique, in the western Cordillera, com- 
mands a view over more than fifteen thousand square 
miles of country. From it the Pacific coast appears to 
be spread out like a map. All the curves of the shore and 
the thousands of bays and islands may be clearly traced. 
Toward the east a gorgeous panorama is spread before 
the eye. Crowning the mountain ranges are snow-capped 
peaks and below them are the purple and brown mountain 
sides. Bands of bright-colored vegetation mark out the 
valleys threaded by winding rivers and interrupted here 
and there by foaming cascades. 

The Cold Paramos of the Mountains. It is difficult 
to say which is more to be dreaded, the heat of the tropical 
plains east of the mountains or the cold of those higher 



3©o SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

portions of the Colombian plateau called pdramos. The 
latter are usually overhung with an intensely cold and 
raw mist and swept by a wind that chills the traveler to 
the bone. They are uninhabited save for a few scattered 
cattle raisers, and the occasional traveler hurries over 
them as quickly as he can. Many an unfortunate animal 
perishes here, and now and then a native caught out upon 
these bleak highlands has lost his life from exposure to the 
cold. It is between the cold paramos and the hot llanos 
that one finds the pleasant forested valleys of Colombia, 
with all varieties of climate and some of the most delight- 
ful views that the country affords (Plate XI). 

Between the three main ranges of the Andes are the 
chief rivers of Colombia. The eastern and the central 
Andes are separated by the long valley of the Magdalena ; 
the valley of the Cauca, the chief tributary of the Magda- 
lena, lies between the central and the western Andes. On 
the eastern face of the eastern Andes are steep mountain 
torrents that swell the rivers of the plains, just as on the 
western slopes of the western Andes there are many short 
mountain streams that run down steep slopes to the 
Pacific. 

Only four important streams remain, and these are at 
the four corners of Colombia, and for this reason will be 
very easy to remember. In the southeastern part of the 
republic is the Guaviare, draining the greater portion of 
the plains country ; the Patia on the southwest cuts across 
the coast ranges or the western Cordillera, and offers a 
pathway from the Pacific coast to the interior valleys; 
between the mountains that are found in the extreme 
northwestern part and the northern end of the western 
Cordillera is the famous Atrato valley, draining toward 
the Caribbean Sea and making another section of Colombia 
available to man; while in the northeastern corner is the 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 301 

Cesar valley and river, a valley rich in pasture and sup- 
porting great herds of cattle. If we remember the two 
central valleys of the Cauca and Magdalena and the four 
streams and valleys at the four corners of the country we 
shall be able easily to understand a great deal of the geog- 
raphy of Colombia, for the people of Colombia depend so 
much upon the valleys for food and trade that only a 
small number live outside them. 

The Magdalena River. How many of us know that the 
Magdalena (Fig. 155) is one of the great rivers of the 
world, and the fourth river in size in South America? 
Laid out upon a map of the United States the Magdalena 
would reach from Philadelphia to Chicago, from New York 
to Florida, from San Francisco to Denver. This great 
river is more than a thousand miles long and drains an 
area larger than England, Scotland, and Wales, or about 
one hundred thousand square miles. What this means 
to the people who live in its basin can be realized only by 
remembering that Colombia has few railways and her 
rivers mean much more to her than the rivers of the 
United States do to us. The Magdalena drains a large 
part of Colombia, is navigable for hundreds of miles, and 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 155. Scene on the lower Magdalena. Here the river is so 
stagnant that plants grow in the water as in a pond 



302 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

is joined by over five hundred tributaries from the 
mountains that flank its valley. 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 156. Barranqailla Harbor, Colombia, where the river journey 

begins. A railroad ten miles long connects Barranquilla 

with the ocean port, Puerto, Colombia 

The upper part of the Magdalena is a steep mountain 
torrent and of little service to man. One hundred and 
seventy miles from its source it is joined by the Neiva, 
and here navigation in the upper Magdalena begins and 
continues for more than a hundred miles to the rapids of 
Honda. These break navigation for twenty miles and 
were once the cause of much expense because all goods 
destined for the plateau and the capital, Bogota, had 
to be carried around them on muleback (Fig. 157). Now 
a short railway provides for the easier passage of goods 
and passengers from the steamer above the rapids to the 
steamer below them. Below the rapids of Honda there 
are more than three hundred miles of navigable water 
right down to the sea ; and for the last two hundred miles 
the Magdalena is a broad and beautiful sheet of water 
(Fig. 175). Side channels branch from the main stream 
to join it again farther down after circling about tracts of 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 



303 



lowland. Along both banks are tropical swamps, some 
of which are flooded when the rivers are high. 

The traffic of the lower Magdalena is carried on 
chiefly by means of stern- and side-wheel steamers (Fig. 
158). During the dry season when the river is low and all 
steamer traffic is stopped or delayed people go down the 
river in champans, a kind of large canoe covered over at 
one end, and worked by a crew of fifteen to eighteen men. 
In addition there are rafts of bamboo which go downstream 
only. When they reach the port for which they are bound 
the logs of the rafts as well as the goods floated down upon 
them are sold, and the owners start back overland or 
return by boat for a new cargo. The river steamers carry 
all kinds of goods, since almost all the supplies for the cities 
and people of the plateau must come up the great river. 





: ^fe: .._. J8fl WsSm 


• 




! 


t* 





Fig. 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

157. Importing goods for Bogota by pack train 



304 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Imported coal is so expensive that the Magdalena 
steamers burn wood, and not only in this respect but 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 158. A Magdalena River steamer. The old-fashioned stern- 
wheeler is still in use here, and wood is burned for fuel 

also in most others they remind one of the boats on 
the Mississippi sixty years ago before railways were built 
throughout the Mississippi lowlands. Two or three times 
a day the steamers run up to the bank and take on fuel. 
The wood is stacked in piles two or three feet across and 
five feet high. Clearings begun at the edge of the river 
gradually grow in size as the trees are removed. A few 
wood cutters live at each landing and inhabit a wretched 
hut or two (Fig. 159). 

To add to the delay of the traveler the steamers find 
the currents and the shoals so difficult to navigate that 
they tie up to the bank at nightfall and wait until day- 
light to continue the voyage. When the water of the 
river is at moderate height steamers can be navigated 
night and day as far as La Gloria, two hundred and 
eighty-two miles above Barranquilla (Fig. 160). The 
river journey is also varied at times by the grounding of 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 



305 



the steamer upon some shallow sand bar, from which it 
is freed only by much patient labor on the part of pilot 
and captain. 
Indians and Negroes of the Hot Lowlands. The 

swampy lowlands of the lower valley of the Magdalena 
have almost no people on account of the widespread floods, 
the unhealthful climate, the great heat, and the abundant 
vegetation. This vast area is without towns except at a 
few small river stations such as Mompos, Tenerife, and 
Tacaloa at the junction of the Cauca and the Magdalena. 
In these sweltering plains and stifling valleys the white 
man does not find life attractive. If he goes there it is 
to stay for a short time only and for purposes of busi- 
ness or adventure or exploration. The white man and 
the Indian live on the uplands; on the hot and unhealth- 
ful lowlands pure-blooded negroes are almost the only 
inhabitants. The few Indians that live on the lowlands 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 159. One of the wood stations on the Magdalena River, Colom- 
bia, where wood cutters supply the river steamers with fuel 

20 



306 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

are still in a state of rudest savagery. The naked tribes 
of the Opon territory, almost within sight from the 
Magdalena steamers, still roam about in the dense forests, 
killing birds and other animals with bow and arrow. 

Upon the plains of the western slope of the country 
fronting the Pacific the people live much the same sort 
of life as in the Magdalena lowlands. Scarcely a sign of 
civilization greets the traveler in making a journey up the 
San Juan River from Buenaventura to Novita. The 
dugout canoes and the naked negroes in them, the palm- 
thatched huts built on stakes on the banks of the rivers, 
the blow-guns, the bows and arrows for fishing purposes, 
the grass ropes and bark sleeping-mats are all as simple 
and primitive as one could find in the depths of a Malayan 
jungle. 

Indians and Whites of the Highlands. Here as else- 
where in the northern part of South America the most 
highly developed peoples are found not on the hot 
lowlands but on the cool highlands. The Indians of 







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' '...',, i ' : :.> .:' .... : ..':' 







Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 160. La Gloria on the Magdalena River 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 307 

the plateau of Colombia, in contrast to their savage 
brothers, lead a very advanced type of life. They have 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 161. Native village, Colombia 

paved roads which cross gorges by means of light sus- 
pension bridges. Long before the discovery of America 
they erected stone shrines to their gods, were skillful 
weavers, dyers, and potters, and even had a form of money 
used in trade. The cool climate of the plateau and high 
mountain valleys made these people more energetic, so 
that they had better homes and applied intelligence to 
their work (Fig. 161). 

The white people of Colombia live well above the 
unhealthful lowlands, on the plateau where the climate 
is invigorating. In spite of the fact that it is only a few 
hundred miles from the equator the winds are cool and 
the temperature mild. It is a land of eternal spring. 
The population is densest here: one hundred and twenty 
per square mile in the most thickly populated parts. The 
people live either on the high plains and basins or in the 
narrower valleys of the cool zone. It is also worth while 
to note that the people of Colombia live chiefly within the 
central valleys. Very few people live in the cool valleys 



308 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

that drain toward the flat plains of the east or that run 
down to the Pacific, because it is extremely difficult to 
carry their products over the rough mountain trails. 
Though the climate of these places is mild and the soil 
fertile 'man finds his crops too far away from the trade 
routes. Goods from the outside world cost too much and 
the cattle and corn of the farms are too remote from 
market to benefit their owners. The forests on the outer 
slopes contain only a sprinkling of population (Plate X). 

The Cattle Ranches of the Cesar Valley. Between the 
Rio Ariguani and the Magdalena the country is low and 
swampy, the water collecting in countless pools and 
hollows. Most of the low hills are occupied by cattle 
corrals. In spite of the abundant and extremely annoying 
insect life the swamps are favorite pasture grounds during 
a part of the year; indeed, between the Nevadas de Santa 
Marta and the Andes are some of the best pasture lands 
in the country. All the rivers of this region flow through 
beautiful savannas which support thousands of cattle. 
During the three summer months when the pastures of 
Valle de Upar on the higher land of the southern edge of 
the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta are parched and dried 
up by the sun, the owners of the ranches set fire to the 
useless grass so that the new growth in the following wet 
season may not be so mixed with the dry grass as not to 
be readily found by the cattle. During this dry period 
the cattle are driven down to the fresh pastures among 
the islands of the Cesar River, where each owner has 
his house and grounds. The main business of the entire 
region is cattle breeding. The cattle are shipped chiefly 
to Cuba for the laborers of the tobacco, sugar, and 
cotton plantations. 

The Towns of Colombia. Many of the towns and 
settlements of the plateau date from the days before the 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 162. Looking eastward from the center of Bogota 

309 



310 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

coming of the Spaniards, while others were founded as 
centers of Spanish authority and government, or as 
missions from which the missionaries of the Catholic 
Church attempted to Christianize the Indians. The 
country towns are very numerous, and form centers of 
trade where the farmers of the region gather for the regular 
weekly market. A few towns have their location deter- 
mined not by the climate but by mineral deposits; others 
have their location determined by trade, as Zipaquira 
by a trade in salt and La Mesa (halfway between Ma'g- 
dalena and Bogota) by the exchange of goods between 
the high and the low lands. But no other city in the 
republic is nearly so large as Bogota, the capital, with its 
fifty thousand people (Fig. 162 and Plate II). 

At or near the mouth of the Magdalena is a group of 
small towns through which goods are shipped for the 
denser populations of the plateau. These are the ports 
of Colombia, but they give little indication of the number 
of people who dwell in the interior. Barranquilla, the 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 



Fig. 163. The walls of Cartagena, built in the old Spanish days 
at a cost of many millions of dollars 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 311 

most important town (Fig. 156), is on the main branch of 
the Magdalena delta and is connected with the exposed 
seaport of Savanilla by a railway twenty miles long. Sand 
banks and shifting channels at the mouth of the river make 
it impossible for boats to sail up the Magdalena from the 
sea. It is as if New Orleans were shut off from the sea, 
as indeed it once was, and had to ship its goods to Mobile 
or Galveston, if these ports were near by. Between 1876 
and 1884 a cattle trade with Cuba was carried on through 
the Boca de Cenizas, the main mouth of the river, without 
serious accident to the steamers, but this route is now 
abandoned in favor of the railway to the seaport. 

West of Savanilla is the old and romantic port of 
Cartagena. In the days when Spain owned this coast 
Cartagena was a great center of trade, from which all 
foreign boats and traders were kept out, and where an 
immense fortress (Fig. 163) was built at a cost of many 
millions of dollars. The only other seaport on the 
Caribbean coast of Colombia is Santa Marta, at the foot of 
the mountain knot from which it takes its name, a place 
now grown famous as the center of a large banana trade. 

Bogota, the Garden of Colombia. Bogota is the gar- 
den spot of Colombia, a favored region in which live a 
happy and prosperous people. The city is located in 
a basin about seventy miles long and thirty miles wide, 
surrounded by a high, treeless mountain wall, the source 
of numerous streams which, with a number of fresh- 
water lakes, supply water to the fields and add beauty to 
the landscape. Near the western edge of the basin plain 
all the streams unite to form the River Funza, or Bogota, 
one of the principal tributaries of the upper Magdalena. 
Just before reaching the edge of the plain the river falls 
over a perpendicular cliff into a deep gorge four hundred 
and ten feet below, the Falls of Tequendama. 



312 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The principal rainy season begins about September 20, 
and lasts until December 20. During this time it rains 
almost every day. The mornings are generally clear, the 
rains beginning about noon and lasting until sunset. 
A shorter wet season occurs in April and May. The dry 
seasons last from January to April and from June to 
September, the sun shining from a clear and almost cloud- 
less sky (Plate I). At night, on account of the high eleva- 
tion at which the city stands, and the clear atmosphere, 
the stars appear unusually brilliant and much larger than 
when seen from the lower valleys or from the coast. 

In this serene valley lies the city of Bogota. It is 
built at the foot of two high peaks that reach almost to 
the limit of perpetual snow. The streets of the city run 
eastward up the lower slopes of the mountains, and are 
crossed at right angles by those running north and south. 
The squares thus formed rise one above another like the 
benches of a vast amphitheater (Fig. 162). Above the 
city are the terraced slopes and overshadowing peaks of 
Guadeloupe and Moncerrate, upon whose topmost peaks 
two massive cathedrals have been built. From either 
mountain one may look westward about ninety miles to 
the frozen summits of two lofty volcanoes, Tolima and 
San Ruiz, northward to the fertile valleys and table-lands 
of Santander and Boyaca, northwestward to the rich 
mining districts of Antioquia, while southward one may 
see ridge after lofty ridge whose slopes descend to the 
hot grasslands of southeastern Colombia. 

Revolutions. Our newspapers say that the revolutions 
of Colombia show how unsettled is the political state of 
the country, but we ought to know that many of them 
scarcely produce a ripple upon the surface of Colombian 
life. A few people think they have a grievance against 
the government. They talk about it a few days and get 



PEOPLES OF COLOMBIA 313 

others to sympathize with them ; some guns are purchased 
and a little trouble started, but the sight of a detach- 
ment of government troops is often enough to end what 
we are accustomed to call "a comic-opera war." Some 
of the so-called revolutions of South America are less 
serious than those of our labor strikes in which men are 
killed and government troops called out to keep order. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 

The Hunting Ground of South America. Venezuela 
has been called the hunting ground of South America, 
not, as one might suppose, because of the many kinds of 
game that abound in its grasslands and tropical forests, 
but because of its government. Securing a part of the 
public money is to many of the officials what hunting wild 
game is to the sportsmen. The chief difference seems 
to be that the grafting official always succeeds while the 
sportsman may not. Everything else about Venezuela 
is of less importance to its people than the fact that the 
country has had until very recently one of the worst 
governments in South America. This is especially inter- 
esting to us here because it seems only yesterday that the 
United States was obliged to think very seriously of 
taking a hand in straightening out the political difficulties 
of the country. 

. The president of Venezuela for many years was an evil- 
minded person who ran the affairs of his country not as 
an honest man but as a criminal. He got control of the 
public money, robbed the merchants of other countries 
who tried to do business in Venezuela, imprisoned people 
who were unfriendly to his bad designs, and ruled less 
like a patriot than a thief. Under such a man the affairs 
of Venezuela fell into a bad way and business was com- 
pletely demoralized. No one cared to sell goods to the 
people of the country for fear that either the buyer would 
be in prison and unable to pay for the goods or that the 
import tax would be so high the goods could not be 

3H 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 315 

marketed. People who wished to go to Venezuela and to 
develop mines or plantations did not do so because their 
property might be seized or be so highly taxed that they 
might as well be robbed outright. 

Blessed with the riches of a tropical plateau, where food 
can be produced in abundance, and where almost every 
kind of plant may be grown, Venezuela so far has been 
a most unhappy land. Think of a country where in the 
past seventy-five years there have been fifty-one revolu- 
tions — on the average, a revolution every sixteen months! 
We are proud to think that in our revolution of 1776 we 
spent some of the best blood in the country to become 
an independent nation. Such a revolution is heroic. It is 
planned from patriotic motives by men working not for 
their own personal good but for the good of all the people. 

Far from this ideal are the revolutions of Venezuela. 
Civil war in Venezuela offers a chance to rob, not a chance 
to fight for a good cause ; it is a time of pillage and burn- 
ing, not a time for risking one's life for one's country; it 
is a chance for evil men to be evil without being punished ; 
a chance for good men to be put into prison simply because 
they oppose those things that will harm the people. It 
is not the rising of all the people against a bad government 
but the rising of one group of bad men against another 
group of bad men with the common people but little 
interested in the result ; for if they lose one set of robbers 
who run the government it is only to gain another set as 
bad or worse. It is this unhappy condition of affairs that 
has kept Venezuela from becoming the powerful and rich 
nation that it deserves to be. Its riches are manifold, and 
it is near the great buying nations of North America and 
Europe ; all that it needs is a good government. With that 
assured, Venezuela will be completely changed. 

Such a change in the condition of Venezuela we have a 



316 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

right to expect at the present time. The despotic ruler 
has been driven out of the country. A new president 
has been elected. The people have become weary of 
being robbed and plundered by mean officials; of seeing 
their president grow rich when the money which he takes 
should be spent in making roads over which cattle could 
be driven to market and in building railways over which 
men might ship their fruits, cotton, and rice, and bring 
in the goods of other countries. The people of other 
countries hope that under her new president Venezuela 
will be free and her people happy. 

Scenery and Towns on the North Coast. Let us turn 
from these unhappy conditions to the brighter side of the 
picture, for Venezuela has indeed some very charming 
aspects. Its rivers, its mountains, its valleys, its ports 
are full of interest. It is also near our doors and we are 
naturally interested in our neighbors. It is only a seven 
days' sail from New York to Venezuela. In a week one 
may pass from our temperate land to tropical Venezuela. 

The chief port of Venezuela and the one through which 
almost all visitors enter the country is Lajjiuaira. Sailors 
call it the worst port in the world. It is merely an open 
roadstead, and even in calm weather there is a heavy 
surf on the steep shore; and when the wind blows, as it 
does almost every afternoon, the waves are so high that it 
becomes dangerous and sometimes impossible to load or 
to unload boats. They must then wait for the waves to 
subside. A pier and a few other works have been made 
to afford a shelter. 

The town built about the port has a single street. This 
is because steep mountains run directly down to the shore 
and there is but little flat land on which houses may be 
built. Part of the town clings to the slope of the moun- 
tains and one wonders that, in this land of earthquakes, 




Plate X. Density of population 



Races of Man 

White HI Red 
WKl Black 




Plate XII. Races of man 



MOUNTAINS- AND LLANOS M 



VENEZUELA 317 
the houses are not shaken off into the sea j . 

port, very hot, damp, and uncomfortably _ -> * 

' dJia °ne feels 




Hiram Bingham 



Fig. 164. View of Caracas, Venezuela 

more as if one were taking a steam bath than walking 
about in the air. Travelers are glad to get away from 
the sweltering port to the cool hills and mountains back 
of the town. 

The railway across the coast ranges back of La Guaira 
unites Caracas, the capital (Fig. 164), with the seacoast 
and with the trade routes of the world. It is astonish- 
ing to find that the distance between the seaport and the 
capital is but a few miles in a straight line and yet that 
it takes several hours to make the journey by train. 
The reason for this is that the railway must cross the range 
of mountains that lies between the port and Caracas. The 
train first climbs over a pass, from which it descends 



318 SOUTH AML \> 

JTlCA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

to the capital f 

requires so rot-our thousand feet above the sea; and it 

miles the tr- ^ Indabout a course that instead of eight 
The ^c.ain must travel twenty-three miles. 

pas° .'xenery along the railway is superb and at the 
.o it becomes extraordinary: on one side is the ocean 

and the port; on 
the other is the val- 
ley leading down to 
the city of Caracas 
surrounded by~ex- 
tensive plantations 
of sugar cane. The 
curves of the rail- 
way are extremely 
sharp and the line 
crosses splendid 
mountain gorges, 
beautiful valleys, 
and sharp moun- 
tain spurs. 

From the foot 
of the coast ranges 
that lie between 
Caracas and La 
Guaira the land 
stretches away for 
hundreds of miles 
toward the interior 
of Venezuela as a 




Fig. 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

:65. The University and the Academy 
of History, Caracas, Venezuela 



succession of valleys and low ranges which at last give 
way to the great interior plains. Caracas itself lies in a 
beautiful mountain valley, surrounded by gardens and 
farms that supply food to the people (Fig. 164). 

The city has many attractive features and the natives 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF ^EZUELiv 3Ip 

are never tired of singing its praises. T *^as are 
objects of great care and beauty. The LV S are W, 
one-story buildings, painted white, with s'toi\ a adobe 
walls and red-tiled roofs. On account of the ^Pjformly 
low houses the town has a flat appearance, which is cTS^n 
but rarely by the towers of the churches or the large 
roof of some high public building (Figs. 165 and 166). 
In the cafes one finds bright Germans, French, and Eng- 
glish who are in Caracas on business or pleasure. They 
furnish small, gay groups that add an enlivening foreign 
air to the town. 

The Outline of the Country. The northern part of 
Venezuela is rugged and mountainous, and mountains 
border it on the southeast as well. But in the interior of 
the country between the mountain systems are the broad 
plains of central Venezuela, the grasslands, or llanos as 
they are called. Between the two extremes of lofty 
mountain and low, flat plain are all kinds of scenery and 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 



FlG. 166. Caracas, Venezuela. Avenida del Sur, the principal 
shopping street, looking toward the cathedral 



SOUTH y ^ERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

v variety °f climate. The Sierra Nevada de Merida (in 
t}-v nOTthwe stern part of the country) alone among the 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 167. On the road to Barinas, western Venezuela. On the 

right are the eastern slopes of the Andes; on the left, the 

piedmont plains that stretch away from the foot 

of the mountains 

mountains of Venezuela has three or four peaks that rise 
into the realm of winter. Elsewhere the mountain 
summits generally have a covering of vegetation. 

Descending from the snowy peaks one passes first 
through the region of mild temperature and beautiful 
climate, then the hot lowlands of the interior. At the 
mouth of the Orinoco one may even sail through plains so 
low that the land for many miles stands only a few inches 
above water. Since each climatic belt has its own char- 
acteristic plants and animals, ' Venezuela is far from being 
a monotonous country. 

The Three Kinds of Plains in Venezuela. To under- 
stand the plains of central Venezuela one must know that 
they are not all alike. Three quite different kinds of 
plains may be seen in going from the mouth of the Orinoco 
to its headwaters in the mountains of eastern Colombia. 
They are all alike in being generally flat, but each was 
formed in a different way. The plains at the mouth of 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 32, 

the Orinoco are almost as flat as the sea, those of the 
interior are either gently rolling or hilly, with streams that 
run in courses cut well below the general level of the 
country, while near the foot of the mountains are swampy 
plains crossed by sluggish rivers. We shall do well to 
call these plains by particular names which may be used 
in describing them. 

The first kind may be called delta plains, and these we 
shall find only at the mouth of the Orinoco; the second 
may be called dissected river plains, and these make up 
most of the interior parts of the llanos country; the third 
occur along the edges of all the mountains, and especially 
along the western edge of the plains where the mountains 
are highest, and are called piedmont alluvial plains (Fig. 
167) because they lie at the foot of the mountains and are 
made of the detritus of the mountains that has been 
carried down through gorges by the mountain streams. 
We shall now ti y to get as clear an idea as possible of these 
three kinds of plains, for some of them support one of 




Fig. 168. Sketch map of the delta of the Orinoco 



21 



322 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

the great sources of wealth, the herds of cattle and mules 
that graze upon their wide pastures. 

The Delta Plains of the Orinoco. The size and nature 
of the delta plains at the mouth of the Orinoco may be 
realized from the map (Fig. 168). This shows the large 
number of river channels that cross them. Instead of 
having one channel to the sea, the Orinoco has many 
channels since it is a delta-building stream. The river 
splits up into a dozen different branches and these again 
into others until there is formed, as the map shows, a 
bewildering network of criss-crossing and interlacing 
channels. The whole of this tract is a great swamp with 
only a few people but with the most luxuriant vegetation. 
For thousands of years the Orinoco has been bringing 
down mud, silt, and sand and depositing them at its 
mouth. Gradually the land has been built up until it 
stands above sea level, but so little above that sometimes 
it is hard to tell where the sea begins and the newly made 
land ends. As the swamp dwellers at the mouth of the 
Mississippi say : "The best way to tell land from water is 
to set up a stick: if it falls over call the surface water, 
and if it stands up call it land." Here upon this half- 
drowned edge of the continent Columbus first thought 
that he had found a continent, for he argued that such 
an enormous body of fresh water could be collected only 
from a river having a long course, and that the land must 
be not an island but a continent. 

Upon the marshes of the lower Orinoco it might seem 
as if no one could live, the land is so wet and the climate 
so hot and unheal thful. Few indeed are the people who 
dwell there, but a number of Indians do make it their 
home and find among the swamps and lagoons of the 
delta both food and shelter. These Indians belong chiefly 
to the tribes known as the Warraus that were described 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 323 

by Raleigh and many later travelers. A few thousand 
of them still survive, but they are fast decreasing in 
numbers on account of their many wars, occasional 
epidemics of disease, the influence of alcohol sold to them 
by unprincipled traders, and the work they are sometimes 
compelled to do on the up-river plantations. Once these 
Indians dwelt farther inland, but they were driven down 
into the delta by the strong and fierce Caribs, or Caraios, 
who in their long war canoes raided their neighbors in 
both the Amazon and the Orinoco basins and conquered 
many of them. 

The delta of the Orinoco has many surprises in store 
for the traveler who paddles up its muddy waters. Not 
the least of these is the way in which new land is being 
slowly made by the work of a tree called the mangrove. 
It fringes all the shores of the delta, lines the channel 
banks, and grows on the border of every lagoon. The 
mangrove tree is peculiar in living chiefly in the water, not 
chiefly in the earth as is the case with most ordinary 
trees. Its long roots — which give it the appearance of 
standing on stilts — are sent down through the shallow 
water and only their lower ends are secured in the bottom 
mud. It seems as if a slight push would topple the man- 
grove over, but it is really well anchored and will grow 
even where there is a moderate surf. Crabs, turtles, 
and fish, besides many other forms of water life, may be 
found about the roots. Mud and sand brought down by 
the streams lodge there also, and, accumulating year 
after year, slowly build up the bottom and make dry 
land. If it were not for these ''marine forests" the land 
would not have been extended so far. 

The great geographer, Humboldt, when he visited 
South America in the early part of the nineteenth century, 
made a voyage up the Orinoco. It is interesting to know 



324 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

that he thought the people of Venezuela represented the 
three states of human society: the life of the hunter in 
the woods of the Orinoco, the pastoral life of the ranchman 
on the grasslands or llanos, and the agricultural life in the 
high valleys and at the foot of the mountains on the coast. 
In large part this observation is true of many other coun- 
tries of South America besides Venezuela, but it will help 
us to remember the nature of the people of Venezuela 
none the less to know that it describes their threefold 
division very accurately. So, having had a glimpse of the 
savages who dwell among the channels and islands of the 
Orinoco delta and find food and shelter in its vast swamps, 
let us look next at the kind of life that depends upon the 
grassy river plains along the Orinoco and its tributaries. 

Scenery of the Grasslands. Upon the vast plains or 
llanos of the Orinoco valley the eye finds many resem- 
blances to the sea. In a wide view the almost level 
plains stretch- out mile after mile toward the horizon; 
the slight irregularities everywhere visible are like the 
waves, the clumps of trees that dot the plains seem like 
islands, and the distant range of mountains like the 
shore. Let us not forget, however, that the plains are 
not smooth everywhere. The flattest and lowest portions 
lie along the valley floors of the large rivers like the 
Orinoco. But in places the tributaries have cut their 
valleys below the higher plains away from the rivers and 
have furrowed them so deeply that when one tries to cross 
the country one finds it in some places decidedly hilly. 
So that there the dissected plains do not appear like a 
waveless sea but rather like a choppy sea. This undu- 
lating surface is also broken by jutting masses of harder 
rock that make island-like interruptions (Fig. 169). 

"From the higher slopes a prospect is commanded of 
one of the grandest scenes in nature. At your feet lies 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OP VENEZUELA 325 

a lovely expanse of meadow, fresh and smootn as the 
best- trimmed lawn, with troops of horses and countless 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 169. The llanos of Casanare, Colombia 

herds of cattle dispersed over the plains. Here and there 
the eye alights on glittering pools and lakelets left by the 
last rains, and now alive with an immense variety of 
aquatic birds. As far as the gaze can reach, the undulat- 
ing grassy plain appears like a shoreless ocean petrified 
after a storm. No language could convey a true picture 
of the varied beauties of the scene — 'the harmonious effects 
of light and shade; the blending of the various green, 
blue, and purple tints flitting in the sunlight over the vast 
panorama ; the stately palms gracefully fanning the glow- 
ing atmosphere, with their majestic crowns of broad and 
shining foliage." (Keane.) 

The grasses of the lianos are of many varieties. Some 
of them are soft as silk and contain food of the best kind 
for cattle and horses. Others are of more interest to the 
botanist than to the herder, for they are more curious than 
valuable. The gamelote is of this kind. It grows tall 
and sharp and cattle will not eat it, while the llaneros or 
cowboys curse it, for it cuts their hands and clothing and 
the legs of their riding animals. 



326 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

The Great Orinoco. The course of the Orinoco is 
extremely irregular and winds in and out in the habit 
of rivers that flow through flat plains. It is bordered 
by magnificent trees that form narrow bands of forest 
along each bank of the stream. The traveler once in a 
while catches a glimpse of open savanna, but for miles 
at a stretch it will more often seem as if he were traveling 
through a forest country rather than through a grass 
country whose rivers are lined with trees. 

During the rainy season (from April to November) 
the river overflows its banks and floods the surrounding 
lowlands. The great floods transform the plains of the 
Orinoco into a vast inland sea, in places one hundred to 
one hundred and twenty miles in extent from north to 
south and hundreds of miles from east to west. The 
floods are especially well marked at Ciudad Bolivar, where 
the water sometimes rises forty or fifty feet and submerges 
the country far and wide. The river covers the lower 
parts of the tree trunks, makes broad lagoons along the 
path of the river, and often completely changes its course 
for miles. The effect of an overflow is seen also in the 
large masses of tree trunks, branches, grass, and bushes 
that are overwhelmed and swept into the stream. The 
branches of the trees catch on the bottom and become 
lodged, other trees and branches are lodged against them, 
and soon there is a natural raft which, if it grows to great 
size, may be a hindrance to navigation. 

It might seem as if the floods of a great river like the 
Orinoco would make large tracts of country useless and 
would either prevent man from coming into the zone of 
floods or drive him out in case he made an attempt to live 
there. Such indeed is the case in many places. Parts of 
the Mississippi valley are not occupied by man because the 
excess of water makes farming too difficult. Many other 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 327 

rivers of the world act in this manner and discourage the 
people who attempt to make homes along their borders. 
Much of the land along the Mississippi has been reclaimed, 
however, by the building of great dikes or levees which 
restrain the water in time of flood and prevent the loss 
of cattle and crops. 

But the people of the Orinoco valley neither run from 
the river nor build dikes to any extent to keep it in its 
regular course. Instead, many of them live in houses 
built on piles or long poles driven into the ground. When 
the river is low and the ground free of water they live on 
the ground, but when the water rises they move to the 
floor above. Life would not be possible in many places 
without dwellings built on piles, and the people would find 
it difficult and sometimes impossible to travel without the 
boats and canoes in which they are accustomed to make 
their way from place to place, looking after their live stock 
on the higher ground away from the river and gathering a 
food supply. Even some of the wealthiest people of the 
lowlands have rude houses built of mud and piles. 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 170. Junction of the two principal tributaries of the A pure 
River, western Venezuela 



328 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

A Seaport in the Llanos. One of the most noted cities 
in Venezuela is Ciudad Bolivar, partly because it is one 













wm »"^~ 




jmmm 






















' "■ " : ■■;."■ 























Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 171. A bongo on the A pure River 

of the few ports of the country, partly because it is in 
the grasslands and reflects their interesting life. It lies 
about halfway between the delta of the Orinoco River 
and the mouth of the Apure — the main branch of the 
Orinoco. Its old name, Angostura, is a more descrip- 
tive name than Ciudad Bolivar. Angostura means "the 
narrows," and refers to the fact that the river banks are 
here close together, and a single port serves the people 
on both sides. The name was changed to Ciudad Bolivar, 
or city of Bolivar, in honor of the patriot Simon Bolivar 
who fought for years against Spanish rule and at last 
freed his country and made it a republic. He is often 
called the George Washington of South America. A 
fine statue in his honor is in one of the principal plazas 
of both Caracas and Ciudad Bolivar. On the left (north) 
bank of the river and across the stream, here only a 
half-mile wide, is the town of Soledad, which it is planned 
to connect with the capital, Caracas. A railway between 
these two cities would bring into use large regions where 
now there are few civilized people and would enable 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 329 

Venezuela to reach lands that without the railway would 
be occupied only by a few scattered Caraio (Carib) and 
Arawak Indian hunters. 

Farther Up the Orinoco is a great tributary, the Apure, 
(Figs. 170 and 171), which has its source in the mountains 
of Colombia several hundred miles west. Here is the very 
heart of the llanos of Venezuela, the grassy plains with 
their herds of cattle, horses, and mules — a great ranch 
country where men are accustomed to the saddle as the 
people of our towns are accustomed to street cars, where 
the roads are trails, the river crossing a ford (Fig. 172), 
and where cattle are the currency of the land. Here is to 
be found much of the wealth of Venezuela and practically 
all of the wealth of the interior. What rubber is to the 
Amazon Basin, tin to Bolivia, and nitrate of soda to the 
people of Chile, the cattle and mules of the llanos are to 
the people of Venezuela. There are other and more im- 
portant industries in the northern valleys near the Carib- 
bean — for example, cacao, coffee, sugar, and fruits of 
many kinds — but the heart of the country, the great 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingh 

Fig. 172. Crossing the Paguei River, western Venezuela 



330 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

interior, is a country of pastoral peoples, the cattlemen 
and herdsmen of Venezuela. 

Ranch Life on the Llanos. The life and scenes of 
this great region are very like those of our grasslands 
in parts of the West fifty to sixty years ago. There is 
the cowboy, the corral, the camp, and the long drive 
to market, for much of the region cannot be reached by 
boat and there are no railways. Large steamers go up 
the Orinoco only so far as Ciudad Bolivar, at the head 
of tidewater, two hundred and sixty miles from the sea. 
During the rainy season, when the waters are high and 
the river deep, smaller steamers continue the river trip 
from Ciudad Bolivar to Nutrias on the Middle Apure and 
there is an irregular service of steamers from the mouth 
of the Apure to Ciudad Bolivar more frequent than that 
to Nutrias. These irregular steamers are the only means 
the people have of sharing the trade of the outside world. 
It is a vast, lonely interior which can never have a great 
development until railways make it possible to export 
cattle more easily. Until then the cowboys must drive 
their cattle long distances to the rivers and wait there for 
the steamer that may not come for two or three weeks 
(Fig. 173). Since there is a limit to the distance that 
cattle may be profitably driven to market, much of the 
interior country is unused except by a few Indians and 
here and there a lonely settler who has made his home in 
the wilderness and lives in an independent way far from 
any neighbor. 

The Prairie Fires of the Grasslands. One of the great 
sights of the llanos are the grass fires that rage every year 
during the dry season. They may be started by some 
one who wishes to burn the range so that the new grass 
of the wet season will grow faster and be more easily 
obtained by the cattle, or they may be started by accident 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OP VENEZUELA 331 

or by lightning. Once started, the fires spread with 
astonishing rapidity and sweep miles of country before 
they are stopped by rain or by a river. Sometimes they 
burn through the night and light up the prairie for miles 
about with a pale yellow light as if the sky were on fire. 
During the progress of a fire crowds of long-tailed scissor 
birds hover round the edge of the flame and eagerly 
swallow insects that rush out of the fire half stupefied by 
smoke. On bushes and trees eagles and falcons eagerly 




Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 173. Cattle on their way to market, llanos of Venezuela 

watch for some frightened animal that rushes from the 
flames only to fall a prey to the hungry, waiting birds. 

Cattle Driving in the Northern Llanos. Between the 
A pure and the northern mountains of Venezuela are the 
most used and the best known of the Venezuelan llanos. 
From the town of San Fernando on the south toward 
Valencia and Caracas on the north there are rolling 
savannas grazed by thousands of cattle. During the dry 
season the cattle are driven along the Apure (Fig. 170) 
where the grass, on account of the wet condition of the 
ground, grows well even during the season of little rain. 
When the rains set in the cattle are driven to the high 
northern savannas; those that are ready for market are 
then separated from the rest of the herd and driven to the 
end of the railway, where they are shipped to the seacoast 



332 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

or sent to the towns that depend upon the llanos herds for 
meat. The high savannas are too dry for pasture during 
the dry season (November to March) , and although a few 
herds are kept there the whole year round they do not 
fatten well. The rains therefore control the migrations 
of the cattle in Venezuela in the same way that the 
seasons control their- migrations in mountainous regions 
like the Alps or the Pyrenees. 

The lower llanos, as the region between the drier upper 
pastures and the Apure is called, and the upper llanos 
south of Valencia are divided into great ranches by long 
barbed-wire fences which are built by the cattlemen in 
common just as they also drive their cattle in common in 
going back and forth between the upper and the lower 
pastures. 

The cowboy of the llanos is called a llanero. He wears 
a broad felt hat and cotton suit, the trousers having a 
long slit at the side. He always rides a mule, of which he 
is an excellent judge, is generally armed with a revolver 
and knife, is a good shot, and seems good-natured and 
honest. He lives on corn cakes toasted over the coals, 
beef or veal, eggs, bananas, cheese, and coffee. 

Animal Life of the Llanos. The marshes and lagoons 
along the water courses of the llanos fairly swarm with 
birds of many kinds. There is the white heron from 
which are obtained valuable egrets, used in trimming 
ladies' hats. • The heron is in danger of extermination on 
account of the numbers that are shot for mis purpose 
every year. Our Congress has set a good example to the 
rest of the world by passing a law preventing their im- 
portation into this country. There are also the flamingo 
with its great breadth of wing, the scarlet ibis, and the 
rose-colored spoonbill. In places a less valuable kind of 
heron as well as many other kinds of birds are found in 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 333 

great "heronries" which are sometimes miles in extent 
and include crane, stork, ibis, and other kinds of birds of 
many colors from gray to a brilliant scarlet. There is also 
a small duck, the guiriri, so called from its cry, and which 
at times rises in such numbers as almost to obscur the sun. 

Along the banks of the streams, especially of the middle 
Orinoco, there are also to be found great numbers of 
turtles. Some of them are three feet long and weigh 
seventy pounds. They lay great numbers of eggs, from 
which are obtained every year about twenty thousand 
gallons of oil. 

One of the tributaries of the Orinoco is called the Tor- 
tuga, which means turtle, a name given to it on account 
of the large number of turtles that live on its banks during 
the months of March and April. The long sloping sand 
banks are their favorite nesting places, and to those 
places the natives go in canoes to collect eggs and to 
kill the turtles for their shells, which are used as basins 
and cooking pots in many Venezuelan households. 

In the rivers are to be found the manatee and the giant 
otter, besides fish of many kinds. Some of the fish are of 
curious forms and habits. There are electric eels of great 
size with a battery strong enough to give a powerful 
electric shock to men who attempt to cross the streams 
by wading or swimming or to horses that come down 
into the shallow, muddy pools of water to drink. There 
is the paillara, somewhat like the salmon, but with large 
tusks working through horny nostrils and a dangerous 
looking row of teeth behind the nostrils. The most 
dreaded of all is the caribe, a bloodthirsty creature with 
a head somewhat like that of a bulldog and with a pro- 
jecting lower jaw. It has sharp three-edged teeth with 
which it can break the strongest fishhook. Large num- 
bers of this fish quickly gather round and kill the weaker 



334 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

animals that cross the stream, and will even attack 
wounded alligators as well as the crocodile. 

Among the reptiles of the Orinoco valley which are 
feared by man the huge anaconda or water snake is most 
important. There is also the boa constrictor, which lives 
in the woods and eats wild animals such as deer or even 
tame calves and colts that stray into its haunts. A very 
poisonous species of snake is the mapanare, which lies 
coiled up on the branches overhanging the river and strikes 
quickly downward at animals passing beneath. 

Of the other animals of the Orinoco lowlands per- 
haps the most interesting is the jaguar, which makes its 
home in the dense forests and is held in great dread 
by the country people. Each year lives are lost on 
account of the ravages of this fierce beast. The puma is 
a cowardly animal as compared with the jaguar. It 
makes its home in the hills and is little feared. The 
haunts of the great gray tapir, the water-hog, and the 
peccary are the wet jungles along the river banks. In 
the grasslands beside the river are hundreds of the small 
savanna deer. These come out of the forest morning and 
evening to feed on the sweet savanna grass, though it is 
hard to approach them, for they are extremely wary and 
as timid as mice. In the forest patches scattered through- 
out the savanna country or the llanos, and along the 
streams, are to be found monkeys; but these are rather 
scarce now since they are so constantly hunted by the 
Indians for food. Few animals that the Indian of the 
llanos hunts are so delicious to his taste as monkey. 

The Forest Lands along the River. Among the trees 
of the llanos region are many which serve the needs of 
man. The palm flourishes here greatly to man's benefit. 
One kind is called "thatch-palm" by the settlers and 
ranchmen, who use it in making a thatch or roof for 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 335 

their houses (Fig. 174); it is called "hat-palm" by the hat 
makers, who braid it into sombreros; and it is called 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 174. Typical ranch house on the llanos of Venezuela 

"fan-palm" by travelers, who use its leaves to drive away 
the troublesome insects. Then there is a tree called the 
mimosa which is like the willow and spreads aloft a 
delicate feathery crown like a dainty parasol. In some 
of the valleys bordering the plains are mahogany, cedar, 
rubber trees, and cinchona of several kinds. The upper 
waters of the Guaniamo are so affected by the sarsaparilla 
growing in great numbers along its banks that the people 
who live in the valley drink the water and bathe in it in 
order to cure themselves of skin diseases, of which they 
have many kinds. 

The Region of Woods. Southern Venezuela is called 
by the natives La zona de los bosques, which means "the 
region of the woods." It will be worth while to see in 
what respects its life differs from that of the plains. It is 
but little known and has a thin population, but it is one 
of the most interesting and certainly one of the most 
mysterious parts of the country and holds many wonders 
that tempt the traveler. Here are forests so vast and so 
dense that men can travel through the region only by 



336 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

following the water courses. Back from the river lanes 
the vegetation is so thick that man can hardly cut his way 
through it. Even the Indians that dwell in the gloomy 
depths of the forest or on the banks of the rivers that 
thread through its great jungles know but little about 
it except that it is the home of the wild beasts which 
they hunt for food; they believe also that in its shadowy 
depths dwell evil spirits that lie in wait for the unwary. 

The People of the Forest. The men who dwell in the 
tropical forest of southern Venezuela are few in number 
and follow the life of the hunter. They have all sorts of 
superstitions about the hills and valleys. Demons live 
among the inaccessible crags of the mountains of the 
south and cause the thunder, the lightning, and the 
wind. Upon one of the mountains their legends have 
placed a large lake so deep that it cannot be fathomed, 
and its waters are believed to be the abode of huge and 
strange creatures not found elsewhere. 

A peculiarity of these people of the forest, living as 
they do far from neighbors, is their differences of speech 
from place to place. Each village has its distinct dialect, 
and this is true even in the case of a small village. Yet 
it is a perfectly natural effect of the kind of country in 
which these people dwell. It seems to be due to the lack 
of any easy means of travel and trade. The forest is so 
dense and vast that it keeps people apart, and wherever 
this happens anywhere in the world each group becomes 
unlike its neighbors. Small differences spring up and 
grow until a separate dialect is developed. Neighboring 
villages have long-standing blood feuds, and their bitter 
quarrels have added to the effect of the forest and increased 
the differences not only of speech but also of manner. 

The Scattered People of the Caura Valley. The great 
Caura tributary that rises within the mountain systems 



.MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 337 

of southern Venezuela flows through dense forests and the 
wildest mountain country and at last comes out upon the 



f a* -- A 








■ 


1 



Courtesy of Hiram Bingham 

Fig. 175. Canoe on the Magdalena loaded with bananas 

plains that border the Orinoco. During the rainy season 
small steamers may go up the Caura for some distance ; but 
it is impossible for them to go beyond Temblador, where 
the journey becomes dangerous for dugout canoes. For 
forty or fifty miles the country is a rolling grass-covered 
plain, bordered by belts or patches of forest in the low 
ground and along the streams. The entire region is 
thinly populated. With the exception of Maripa few of 
the places can be called even villages; they are merely 
clearings where rice, sugar cane, bananas, potatoes, and 
yams are grown, and where one may find a house or two, 
the home of the settler to whom the little plantation 
belongs. The people do business in tonka beans, cedar, 
and copaiba oil. Some years ago tonka beans brought 
as much as four dollars a pound and collecting them 



22 



338 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

became the principal business of the people, but to-day 
the price is very low and the people have turned to the 
raising of rice as their principal means of livelihood. 
This they ship to Ciudad Bolivar. 

The Indians of the Caura. On the upper waters of the 
Caura the Indians appear, first those that depend partly 
upon agriculture for food and live in clearings in the forest 
and then Indians that live by hunting and fishing. The 
little Indian farms of the clearings are worked in the 
most simple way. Corn is planted in a hole made by 
thrusting a sharp stick into the ground. Some cotton is 
grown and is employed in making hammocks, which the 
Indians use almost entirely as sleeping places. Even 
those Indians that till the ground get a part of their food 
supply from forest and stream. They are expert fisher- 
men with the bow and arrow and also use the hook and 
line. All game which they keep from one day to the next 
is smoked. When food happens to be plentiful they eat 
a great deal, frequently getting up in the night to eat, and 
when there is no food on hand they go hungry. In the 
immediate neighborhood of the clearings, game is scarce, 
but now and then a tapir is killed, or a wild hog or peccary, 
when he visits the garden, but this does not happen often. 

The Wild Mountain Country of the South. Along the 
southern border of Venezuela are the mountains of the 
SerraPacaraima and Serra Parima. This is the southern 
frontier of Venezuela, where only wild savages dwell, 
a little-known and mysterious land into which the white 
settler will not venture for many years to come. It is 
the land of crag and wild beast, of forest and savage 
Indian. When the Commission appointed to lay down 
the boundary between Venezuela and Brazil in 1880- 
1883 did their field work they did not even visit the 
Parima and Pacaraima highland; they merely guessed 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 339 

at the positions of the mountain crests and drew their 
boundary lines accordingly. 

Coastal Features and Harbors. The interior of Vene- 
zuela is not easy to reach from the sea on account of the 
obstacles which lie along its coast. The Orinoco delta 
— low, hot, marshy, bordered by mangrove swamps, and 
without products useful to man — stretches along the 
eastern coast for seven hundred miles, almost as far as 
from Charleston to New York. Along the northern 
coast a range of mountains borders the shore, and its 
steep slopes descend to sea level, offering only a few havens 
where ships may lie safely at anchor and load and 
unload their cargoes. One coast is too low and the other 
too high; one is too flat, the other too steep; one has 
abundant channels to the interior where the interior is of 
least use to man ; the other has no natural harbors where 
harbors are sorely needed, for most of the present wealth 
of Venezuela is to be found along the north shore and the 
country bordering the southern edge of the coast ranges. 
The only stream in all Venezuela that is navigable from 
the sea, besides the Orinoco and a few of its longest 
branches, is the Catatumbo, which empties into the Gulf 
or Lake of Maracaibo on the northwestern coast. It and 
its chief tributary, the Zulia River, are navigable by small 
steamers throughout the year. Even this river system, 
small as it is, belongs practically in part to Colombia, for 
it is through the upper valley that the Colombians of 
the province of Magdalena find their way to the sea for 
travel and the shipment of goods. 

The "Little Venice" of Venezuela. The only deep 
embayment along the whole coast of Venezuela is the Gulf 
of Maracaibo to which the Catatumbo is tributary. But 
if Venezuela has no good natural harbors on account of 
the mountains and the delta, and if her inlets are few in 



340 vSOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

number, she has at least the distinction of having the 
largest inlet on the entire northern coast of South America : 
the Gulf of Maracaibo. It should really be called a lake 
because its waters are fresh, a condition due partly to the 
large amount of rain that falls upon the seaward slopes of 
the coast ranges and is carried down to the Maracaibo 
by its many tributaries and partly also to the fact that 
at the mouth of the lake there is a huge sand bar which 
practically keeps out the tides and prevents the salt and 
the fresh water from being mixed. The "Sack of Vene- 
zuela," as the gulf is called, has an area as great as the 
state of Rhode Island— nine thousand square miles. 

At this point on the coast of Venezuela there is also an 
outer embayment, the Gulf of Venezuela. Sometimes it 
is called the Gulf of Venice for a rather interesting, reason. 
When Hojeda and Vespucci, two Spanish explorers who 
sailed the coast of Venezuela in 1499, first came in sight 
of the outer gulf they found there a group of water- 
houses, or dwellings on piles with waterways between 
the rows of dwellings, and canoes tied to the posts. The 
picture seemed to them very much like that at Venice 
where the houses are built on the water's edge and the 
canals are used in place of streets, and where every one 
makes his way about in gondolas. So they called the 
place " Little Venice," and the inlet for a time was indeed 
called Venice. Little Venice is translated in the Spanish 
"Venezuela," a pretty name that soon spread to the 
whole region. This was the name given to the Spanish 
colony of the place, and when the colony became inde- 
pendent through the work of Bolivar and others, the 
republic they formed was called Venezuela. 

Since the Gulf or Lake of Maracaibo is the natural outlet 
of a large region which includes not only part of Venezuela 
but also a portion of Colombia, a large town has grown 



MOUNTAINS AND LLANOS OF VENEZUELA 341 

up through which the business of the country is done. 
This is the town and port of Maracaibo, built on the shore 
of the channel connecting the outer and inner bays. It 
is the chief port whence are sent the coffee grown on the 
hillside plantations, the cacao from the lowlands about the 
shores of the bay, the cattle and hides from the ranches 
of the hills and mountain valleys that rim the gulf and 
the grasslands that stretch south of them, the minerals 
that are mined in the mountains roundabout, and all the 
other produce of the region. Here are also found even 
to-day pile dwellings like those that gave the name to the 
region and still lend a peculiar aspect to the place. In 
the life of the Maracaibo streets there is a curious mixture 
of speech and habit. The old dwellers on the shore are 
still here, and here too are the Indian of the uplands, 
the Spanish planter and ranchman, and French and 
German merchants with their stock of imported goods 
for shipment to the interior. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE GUIANAS: THE ONLY EUROPEAN 
COLONIES IN SOUTH AMERICA 

The Three Guianas. Upon the northeastern shore of 
South America are three colonies of special interest be- 
cause they are the sole mainland possessions of European 
countries on the continent. They are the Guianas — 
English, French, and Dutch Guiana. We hear little about 
them in this country, for they are not generally visited 
by tourists as is the case with most other countries of 
South America. They have had a rather complex political 
history, having changed hands several times after the 
close of one or another European war. One may, however, 
find in them many things of interest : beatitiful landscapes, 
great waterfalls, curious peoples, and large towns. 

Where the People Live. While the Guianas are of 
considerable size, they are so hot and unheal thful that 
few white people live in them, and these for the most 
part live along the coast and the banks of the rivers. 
More than nine tenths of all the people live on the low, 
hot, fever-stricken plains within four or five miles of 
the sea. Only about one hundred and fifty square miles 
are under cultivation in British Guiana, about sixty-five 
square miles in Dutch Guiana, and but fifteen square miles 
in French Guiana. French Guiana has been used for 
many years as a penal station to which are banished con- 
victs from France sentenced to more than eight years' 
hard labor (Fig. 176). The most successful of the three 
colonies is British Guiana,- with a white population of 
more than a quarter of a million. Dutch Guiana comes 

342 



THE GUIANAS 



next, with a population of eighty-five thousand, while 
French Guiana numbers but thirty thousand people. 

The Swamps and Dikes 
of Guiana. The lowland 
portion of Guiana is from 
thirty to fifty miles wide 
and extends landward as 
an alluvial plain in which 
the streams deposit clays 
and sands, and great 
masses of tangled vegeta- 
tion, that come floating 
down from the forest-bor- 
dered banks .farther up 
stream. The outer shore 
is bordered by mangroves 
and courida bushes in very 
much the same way as 
these water-loving plants 
border the outer shores of 
the delta of the Orinoco 
and the banks of all the 
streams. About the mat- 
ted roots of the tangled 
mangroves, water-loving 
sedges take root, and these 
and the roots themselves 
clog the rivers and' make 
them deposit their silt, 
gradually building up the 
bottom until a tract form- 
erly under water is made into marsh and finally into land. 

The courida bush has a great mass of club-like roots 
projecting above the bottom muds and anchored in them. 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 176. Convicts on the way to 
work, Cayenne, Frefich Guiana 



344 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

Neither the hot sunshine at low tide when the roots are 
exposed to the air, nor the salt water at high tide, have 
any bad effect upon the plant, though such extremes 
would destroy an ordinary tree. But if a planter cuts 
down the courida or the mangroves to let in the cool 
breeze, the sea gnaws away at the roots until they are 
destroyed and then invades the land. 

Upon the flat lowland the English, Dutch, and French 
have laid out plantations of sugar, rice, and tropical 
fruits. The narrow strip of land along the coast on 
which these plantations are found is not more than 
eight or ten miles wide. The traveler to Dutch Guiana 
is surprised at the sight of certain features which are 
thought more characteristic of the Netherlands than of 
the Guianas of South America. The land lies so low 
that it is constantly threatened by the sea, and the 
people have at great expense built a sea dike for the 
protection of their homes. But the defenses of the Dutch 
have not always been successful. At one time the 
settlement of Nickerie on the Corentyn River had 
streets lined with stores, public buildings, and churches. 
But bit by bit the land was torn away and one house 
after another carried off, until finally even the gardens 
back of the town were invaded, and to-day only a small 
part of Nickerie remains. 

The lowland rivers wind about in the most erratic 
manner before they reach the sea. In many cases the 
narrow necks of land between river curves have been 
connected by short, deep, and navigable canals built 
with the painstaking care for which the Dutch are famous, 
creeks and canals completing an intricate system of 
waterways which combine the features of Venice and 
Holland. 

Except for a few diamonds and a little rubber and 



THE GUIANAS 



345 



valuable wood, from the interior, the products of the 
Guianas come wholly from the alluvial lands near the sea. 
Sugar (Fig. 177) has always been the most important 
export together with the related products, molasses and 
rum. Coffee was produced at one time in large amounts, 
but its production has never compared with that of 
the great coffee countries. The lowlands are admirably 
suited for rice, which requires repeated flooding and 
increasing quantities of fine quality are raised, besides 
sea-island cotton. The chief difficulty arises from an 
occasional drought. For example, in 1911-1912 the rain- 
fall was so scant that but fifty per cent of the average 
amount of sugar was exported and the rice crop of March 
and April was a complete failure. Dutch Guiana also 
produces important quantities of tropical fruit and 
French Guiana exports cacao, besides sugar and coffee. 
The Savannas and Mountains of the Interior. Inland 
from the low coastal strip of the Guianas are the savannas 




Fig. 



77- 



Laborers' dwellings on a sugar plantation in British Guiana 



346 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

or grassy plains like the llanos of Venezuela, and with 
somewhat the same kind of life. Farther inland are 
the mountains and low plateaus, the most famous and 
the highest of which is Roraima (8,635 feet), in British 
Guiana, a great sandstone table with bordering rock 
walls three thousand feet high, the first half of the 
descent being' vertical. From the top of this table 
mountain there fall several small streams which are far 
and away the highest waterfalls on the earth — sixteen 
hundred feet. So high, indeed, are these wonderful 
cascades that long before the water reaches the foot of 
the cliff it is blown into thousands of ribbons of spray. 

The most famous of all the great falls of the mountain 
country are the Kaieteur Falls in the Potaro valley with 
a drop of seven hundred and forty-one feet — more than 
four times as high as Niagara. So deep is the gorge into 
which the great river tumbles that only now and then 
does a sound come out of the depths other than the 
subdued rumble that may be heard at all times. When 
the wind blows from below, a deep roar comes up from 
the river- worn caverns. The spray rising from the falls 
waters the gorge walls copiously and supports a brilliant 
green moss which lends a dash of color to the otherwise 
somber Guiana forest. 

The Animals of the Coastal Swamps. In the swampy 
districts of the coast are found the marsh deer, and the wild 
dog which hunts in large packs like the wolves of northern 
countries. In common with other regions in South 
America, the lowlands of Guiana are also the home of tapirs 
(Fig. 178) and several kinds of peccaries that travel about 
in herds of a hundred or more, and are sometimes danger- 
ous to man. Here also are found the bell bird, with a 
musical note that sounds like two iron bars struck to- 
gether; and the quow, which is about the size of a pigeon 



THE GUIANAS 



347 



and makes a deep, low sound like the lowing of a calf, 
and is generally called the "calf bird." Millions of water- 
fowl of many kinds live on the river banks and find their 
food in the muddy water of the rivers or in the tangled 
depths of the forest far from man. The coast meadows 
literally swarm with the wild fowl of the country. The 
great white heron, the ibis, the egret, and the spurwing 
occur in thousands, and almost every bush and tree 
has its birds of prey that sit and plume themselves by 
the hour. 

Besides these birds are others commonly found in 
tropical regions and especially in tropical South America. 
Among them are parrots, macaws, chatterers, humming 
birds, vultures, hawks, and owls. Almost all of them are 
noted for their brilliant plumage, which is most attractive 
in contrast to the greens and browns of the dense tropical 
foliage. But the birds of the tropics, however beautiful 
they appear to the eye, are not attractive to the ear; 




Fig. 178. Tapir and young, one of the wild animals found in 
British Guiana 



34§ SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

their notes are coarse or guttural and in place of the 
musical tones of our northern birds one hears only sharp, 
shrill calls or loud, booming, throaty tones. 

The Migratory Indians of the Savannas. When the 
white man came to Guiana he found the country overrun 
by scattered tribes of Indians; but to-day the Indian 
people are confined almost wholly to the interior. They 
have not gotten on well with the whites and under harsh 
treatment have fled farther and farther from the coast. 
Upon the interior savannas, the grasslands of Guiana, 
they still live in tribes and maintain nomadic habits, 
a peculiar religion, and strange social customs. They 
roam about at pleasure, although each tribe when hunt- 
ing confines itself to a district that is not claimed by 
any other tribe in the country. They live as best they 
can in rough shelters such as may be made from huge 
palms, whose broad, flat leaves can be fastened together 
with little difficulty as a protection from the rain. Their 
shelter is but slightly better than that of the wild beasts 
they hunt for food. The only furniture they have are 
hammocks of their own making, which they use alike for 
sitting and for sleeping. It is the business of the men to 
hunt and fish, and of the women to cultivate the cassava, 
to weave the hammocks, prepare the food, and brew the 
drink. A stop is made in one place only long enough for 
a crop to be grown or until the game fails, when they 
embark in their rough canoes and search the rivers for 
some other hunting site. 

The River Names. Every river and waterfall of the 
Indian country has its unseen deity and all the rivers are 
named from the kind of game found in them or from some 
striking characteristic which first impressed the people. 
One stream is called Macaw Creek, for the macaw is found 
there in greater numbers than is any other tropical bird. 



THE GUIANAS 349 

Another is called Tapir Creek, another the Silk-cotton 
Creek, another the Creek of Flies and Mosquitos, another 
Snake Creek, and still another was called after the peculiar 
note of the frogs that inhabit it in great numbers. While 
the Indian names appear to us to have a very foolish sound, 
they are full of meaning to the natives and of downright 
value in their hunting expeditions. Hardly a game bird, 
beast, or fish can be mentioned whose name has not been 
used in the naming of some creek or river or mountain 
brook in the Guianas. 

Other streams were named for the fruits on their shores, 
the nuts, wild plums, and pineapples gathered there for 
food. The Indians have not named a single stream for 
a person. It always bears some name which indicates 
what sort of a stream it is, what kind of food may be 
found there, whether it is easy or difficult to travel, or 
if it is known for its wild beasts and snakes. 

Even the largest river of the Guianas bears an Indian 
name to which the Indians at one time attached signifi- 
cance. The name means in the Indian language "The 
River of Fire Stones," and is founded upon a story to the 
effect that a fleet of canoes filled with Arawak Indians 
once sought shelter at its mouth. A heavy storm was en- 
countered and made it necessary to turn the canoes back 
behind some sheltering point. In turning up the river most 
of the canoes were upset. The Indians swam ashore, and 
later recovered their canoes, but not their fire stones. The 
fire stones are always carried in the bottoms of the canoes 
and are used in supporting the pots in which the Indians 
cook their, food. It is of great importance to have these 
because the land is so low and flat that camp sites are found 
with great difficulty; and the alluvial river plains near the 
coast are of such fine material that stones are not found 
there. They must be brought oftentimes from great 



35° SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

distances, from the uplands and mountains of the interior, 
and are bought and sold like ordinary merchandise. To 
the Indians, the loss of the fire stones is a serious matter, 
quite as serious as if a cooking pot or a bow and arrow were 
lost, indeed more so, for the latter can easily be made 
almost anywhere. So the Arawaks named the river 
"The River of the Fire Stones," or the Essequibo River, 
and the Arawak word for this phrase was adopted by the 
whites and is in use to-day. 

The Bush Negroes of the Forest. The "bush negroes" 
are a group of people found only in Dutch Guiana. 
Their settlements extend from near the French frontier 
westward to about the source of the Coppename River. 
They are a fine-looking lot of people: many of the men 
are more than six feet tall, with straight limbs and frank 
countenances. In many respects they live like the 
negroes one may find in the interior of Africa. They 
cultivate farms and even engage to some extent in the 
lumber trade. 

The bush negroes were once slaves of the Dutch, but 
there were so many of them in the land that they became 
much stronger than their masters, and were able to gain 
their freedom. They ran away from their owners by 
thousands and were soon lost in the dense forest, through 
which their pursuers could travel only with the greatest 
difficulty. Once in the forest they could live as they had 
lived in Africa, by hunting and fishing and by cultivating 
the few simple vegetables upon which they depend for 
their supply of food. The Dutch were not inclined, how- 
ever, to sit idly by and see their former slaves run off into 
the woods. They began a series of wars which lasted 
for more than seventy years and which cost not less than 
thirty millions of dollars. In addition to this great cost 
in money one must remember the great loss in lives, the 



THE GUI AX AS 351 

bitter feeling the war caused between the whites and the 
blacks, and the terrible blow which all these events dealt 
to the industries of the colony. 

The Beautiful Forests of the Guianas. Nothing in the 
Guianas is more impressive than the great primeval forest 
as seen on the banks of the Essequibo in British Guiana. 
One may travel up the middle course of this river for 
seventy miles without finding an opening except where 
some tributary stream flows into it. The profuse vegeta- 
tion literally hangs over the surface of the river like a 
curtain. But if the great South American forest is impres- 
sive and imposing, it is at the same time forbidding. On 
either bank the vegetation reaches to a height of from one 
hundred and seventy-five to two hundred feet, the whole 
forest being bound with innumerable creepers and trailers 
into a mass that the eye can scarcely penetrate. The 
sunlight barely reaches its interior, and what there is of it 
appears in scattered patches of reflected light. 

"Now the creek is almost closed by a lattice of bush- 
ropes and then we have to pass under a leaning trunk or 
branch almost touching the water. Hundreds of cord- 
like aerial roots depend from the topmost branches of the 
trees, and have to be moved aside as we get among them, 
while great bunches of flowers depend from the creepers, 
which also obstruct the way in some places. 

"If the creek is not kept open by Indians it is often 
choked by vegetation. A dense wall of creepers forms a 
curtain, and we can only push through by aid of our 
cutlasses, which are always carried for this purpose in bush 
traveling. Under water are the remains of trees which 
have fallen during several centuries. . . . When a giant 
mora is undermined by the flood, and can no longer be 
supported by its weaker neighbors, it comes down with a 
crash, carrying destruction to everything in its way. A 



352 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

score of smaller trees will have their heads torn off or 
limbs severed, and perhaps a hundred palms, marantas, 
and low bushes be smashed to pieces." (Keane.) 

In traveling through British Guiana one is struck by 
the almost total absence of anything beyond the wall of 
vegetation on either hand. Scarcely a single hut of any 
kind may be seen for miles. Only by looking closely at 
the river banks can one see, here and there under the 
bushes, a canoe or a small boat. If one goes closer, he 
finds a small opening; and if the water is low, a log may 
be seen lying on the mud; this is the landing stage. By 
means of it one may get ashore and find a narrow, muddy 
path which leads through the forest to a tiny hut, 
thatched with palm leaves, far back from the river. 

A City below Sea Level. The most important city in 
the Guianas is Georgetown in British Guiana, with a 
population of fifty thousand. The greater part of it is 
below the level of high tide so that the houses are built on 
piles. On the whole it is a very unheal thful location in 
spite of the cool sea breezes that blow almost constantly 
during the day. The flat plain on which the city is 
built is drained with great difficulty. Through the center 
of many streets canals have been dug and on the placid 
surface of the water in them enormous Victoria Regia 
water lilies float. During a large part of the year the 
rains are heavy and frequent, a condition which has 
given rise to the saying in Georgetown that it only stops 
raining to begin pouring. Since the rains are abundant 
and the river water stagnant and unfit to drink the people 
depend upon rain water for drinking purposes, gathering 
it in cisterns built beside the houses so as to catch the 
drainage of the roof. 

Georgetown exhibits a great mixture of races. There 
are negroes from Africa, coolies from India, and native 



THE GUIAXAS 



353 



Indians, besides Portuguese, Chinese, English, Spanish, 
Jewish, and Dutch. The coolies were brought over from 
India to work on the sugar plantations just outside of 
Georgetown, for at one time the production of sugar was 
a great industry here but declined chiefly on account of 
the liberation of the slaves. 

A short distance outside Georgetown the country- 
becomes wild, and a thick jungle borders the banks of the 
rivers. With the exception of a short railway line the 




Courtesy of W. D. Boyce 

Fig. 179. A view of Paramaribo, the capital of Dutch Guiana 

only means of communication is by boats of all sorts 
along the courses of the various lagoons, creeks, and 
rivers. For some distance inland the streams have 
gentle currents and the ocean tides run far upstream — on 
the Demarara for about ninety miles. Soon, however, 
the river boats reach a more rugged country with a 
series of great waterfalls around whose deep gorges and 
foaming cascades every pound of merchandise must be 
taken on men's backs with great labor. At many of 
them are towns of some importance where a carrying 
trade for the river merchants has sprung up. 

Cayenne, the capital of French Guiana, and Para- 
maribo (Fig. 179), the capital of Dutch Guiana, are the. 

23 
/ 



354 SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 

only other cities in the Guianas. All other centers of pop- 
ulation are mere villages beside the rivers and canals or 
on the few footpaths and poor trails that lead toward 
the interior. The village populations rarely exceed a 
thousand; and a few dozen or a few hundred are much 
more common. Cayenne has thirteen thousand five 
hundred people and Paramaribo has thirty-four thousand, 
or about one third and one half of the total population of 
French and Dutch Guiana, respectively. Both are on the 
fringe of the land. Cayenne is on an island of the same 
name and Paramaribo is near the mouth of the Surinam 
River. Of the two, Paramaribo is by far the cleaner and 
the more beautiful. Both have high temperatures, are 
built almost at sea level, and are unhealthful. They 
represent, with Georgetown, the climax of such civilization 
as exists in these strange and backward tropical colonies 
— all that are left of the once vast European possessions 
in vSouth America. 



THE INDEX 



All figures refer to pages; stars indicate illustrations and maps. 



Aconcagua, 75. 

Acre, 260. 

Agassiz, Louis, 268. 

Agriculture, see Farming. 

Aguirre, Lope de, 237. 

Alfalfa, Argentine, 33, 43*. 

Alpacas, 139. 

Amazon Basin, 3, 199, 204, 218, 296; 
Indians, 245-253; rubber forest, 
251-253; trade, 265; turtles, load- 
ing, 263*. 

Amazon River, 6, 84, 206, 237-242, 
241*, 269, 297; canoe, travel on, 
242*; drainage, 239; explorers of, 
268-269; length, 241; settlement on 
the, 238*; source, 241; tributaries, 
239, 241, 264. 

Amazon Valley, cacao, 252, 255; 
climate, 242; forests, 242-245; 
people, distribution of, 253; rainfall, 
241, 242; rubber, 237, 255-269; 
salt, 264. 

Amazonas, 200. 

Amazonia, 237-269. 

Ambato, 285. 

Ambato-Riobamba road, a country 
housewife grinding oats for bread in 
a home on, 282*. 

Andes, 3, 6, 29-30, 37, 38, 55, 85, 88*, 
146, 148, 239, 246*. 297, 298, 300, 
308 ; mountain trail in the Maritime, 
88*; mountain village in the eastern, 
137*. 

Angostura, see Ciudad Bolivar. 

Animals, Argentine, 45-46; Bolivia, 
139, 140-142, 143; Chile, 78, 79; 
Ecuador, 274, 276; Guiana, 346-348; 
Peru, 139, 140-142, 143; Venezuela, 
332-334; see also names of animals. 

Antofagasta, 99, 113, 119, 122; 
unloading merchandise, 123*. 

Antofagasta-Bolivia railway, sail-car 
on, 85*. 

Apure River, 328, 329, 330, 331; 
bongo on the, 328*; junction of 
tributaries of, 327*. 

Araucanians, 173. 

Araucaria, veg°tation map between 
pp. 316 and 317*. 

Arequipa, 110; washing and drying 
wool from the Andean table-lands 
in, 144*. 

Argentine, 3, 6, 11, 27, 29, 34, 35-72, 
75, 192, 198, 215, 216; alfalfa, 33, 
43*; animals of the pampas in, 
45-46; araucaria forests, vegetation 
map, between pp. 316 and 317*; 
as one of the world's granaries, 48 ; 



borax, 59; boundary disputes, 75, 76; 
cattle, 51, 55; cities, 61-69, see 
also names of cities; climate, 41-42, 
59, 60, 71; coal, 50-51; copper, 56; 
cowboy, 40*; 181*; dairying, 52; 
dry basin region, 59-60; exports, 67; 
farming, 38*, 42, 43*; floods, 42, 70; 
forests, 70, vegetation map between 
pp. 316 and 317*; fruit, 57; gauchos 
(cowboys), 46-47, 181*; goats, 60*; 
gold, 56; Gran Chaco, 176-184; 
grasslands, 70-72; grazing, 36, 41, 
52, 60-61, 71; homes, 60; horseback 
riding, 39, 40*; horses, 52; iron, 56; 
llamas, 60, 61; manufactures, 48-50; 
mining, 56-58; pampas, 37-48; 
population, 35; ports, 66-68; que- 
bracho logs, 182*; railroads, 52*. 
53-56; rainfall in the pampas, 42; 
ranch, 48*, 47*, 49*; salt, 37, 59; 
sheep, 46, 52, 60*; silver, 56; size, 
35; squatters, 71; stream bed used 
as a road in northwestern, 56*; 
sugar, 10, 178*; transportation, 
53-54; 58-59; wheat, 48, 50*. 

Arica, province, 111; town, 110, 111, 
112, 124, famous hill near, 112*. 

Asuncion, 191; capital and largest 
city of Paraguay, 188*. 

Atacama Desert, Chaco cattle, 180*; 
pastoral nomads with flocks of sheep 
and goats on western border, 60*; 
white sand drifts, 109*; wind ripples 
on surface of a sand dune, 86*. 

Atrato River, 300. 

Aullagas, 133. 

Babahoyo River, natives poling boat, 

277*. 
Bahia (Sao Salvador), 10, 204; looking 

across the bay from the port, 204*; 

one of the coastal cities of Brazil,205*. 
Bahia Blanca, 68-69. 
Bananas, 266; Brazil, 213; Colombia, 

311; Venezuela, 337. 
Barley, Bolivia, 155; Peru, 155. 
Barranquilla, 310-311; harbor where 

the river journey begins, 302*; 

sewing class in a school in, 296*. 
Barrier reef of Brazil, 235-236. 
Batelao, 258-259; hauling across falls 

of Madeira, 259*; rubber unloaded 

from, 257*. 
Bear, 276. 
Belem, see Para. 
Bermejo River, 177, 178. 
Birds of the Argentine pampas, 44; 

Guiana, 346-347. 



XIV SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Black race, Races of Man, facing 
p. 317*. 

Blow-gun, 275. 

Boca de Cenizas, 311. 

Bodegas, 291-293. 

Bogota, 302, 310, 311-312; looking 
eastward from the center of, 309*. 

Bogota River, see Funza. 

Bolivar, Simon, 328. 

Bolivia, 9, 192. 264; animals, 134,139, 
140-143, 142* 148; barley, 155; 
cactus, 150; cities, 132, 152-156, 
252*, see also names of cities; 
climate, 128, 155, 157-159, 160; 
farming, 135-136; fishing, 143-145; 
fuel, 149-152; Gran Chaco, 176-184; 
grazing, 139-140, 163; highland 
dwellers, 128-160; homes, 128, 136, 
153, 160, 250*; hunting, 142; Incas, 
161-175; Indians, 243*. 248-251; 
irrigation, 133-134, 136; minerals, 
110, 128, 130, 134; money, ten-cent 
piece, 141*; mountain folk of western, 
148-149, 156-160; mountains, 137*; 
oven, out-of-door, 151*; plateau and 
valley contrasts, 160; plateau of 
western, 158*; plateau without trees, 
136-139; population, density of, 
130*, 132-133; potatoes, 155; prod- 
ucts, 155, 163; railroad, 85*; relief 
map, 129*; rubber, 183, 200; salt, 
138*, 146-148, 148*, 264; scene in 
western, 138*; sheep, 134, 139; 
silver, 128; "Switzerland of South 
America," 128; terraced alluvial 
fans, 134*, 134-136; wool, 142, 155. 

Bombilla, 216. 

Borax, Argentine, 59; Chile, 114, 
115; Peru, 111. 

Botafogo, 233; Avenida Beiro Mar, 
Rio de Janeiro, 231*. 

Boundary disputes, Chile and Argen- 
tine, 75, 76; Chile and Peru, 110- 
112; Ecuador, 272; Incas and Span- 
iards, 172-173. 

Boundary treaty of Colombia and 
Brazil, 298. 

Bravo River, 65. 

Brazil, 82, 198, 199-236, 264; 
Amazon Basin, 199, 204, 218; 
animals, 199, 227; araucaria, 215- 
217, vegetation map between pp. 
316 and 317*; bananas, 213; barrier 
reef, 235-236; boundary treaty 
between Colombia and, 298; cacao, 
280; campos, 211-214; carnauba, 
229-230; cattle, 199, 209, 227; 
cities, 205*, 219-220, 219*, 222*, 
224*, 230-235, 231*, 232*, 233*, 
234*, see also names of cities; 
climate, 201, 204-210, 217, 218, 
220; coffee, 10, 199*. 210*, 212, 
217-224, 222*, 223*, 224*, 227; 
coffee district, 218*; cotton, 227; 
coral, 235; diamonds, 225; exports, 
219; farming, 226-227; forests, 227, 
vegetation map between pp. 316 and 



317*; grasses, 209, 212-214; grazing, 
212, 227; hurricanes, 207; Indians, 
202, 215; iron, 225, 226; irrigation, 
208; mining, 199, 224-227; moun- 
tains, 204-205; New Germany in, 
211; origin of name, 229; palms, 
213; people, 202-204; population, 
200; railroads, 217, 218; rainfall, 
206-207; rice, 212, 214-215; rubber, 
199; salt, 230; size, 200-201; soil, 
216-217; sugar, 212, 213, 227, 229; 
tea, 215-217; tobacco, 227; wax, 
230; white population in, 203-204; 
winds, 204-205; wine, 229. 

British Guiana, 342; cities, 352-353; 
fruit, 344; laborers' dwellings on a 
sugar plantation, 345*; population, 
342; rice, 344; sugar, 344, 353. 

Buenaventura, 306. 

Buenos Aires, 10, 42, 53, 54, 61-66, 
197; buildings and people, 62-63; 
Central Market, 63, 64*; lights and 
buoys of the river port, 64-65. 

Bullock wagons, 53-54. 

Cacao, Amazon Valley, 252, 255; 

Brazil, 280; Ecuador, 11, 278, 280, 

290*, 291; French Guiana, 345; 

gathering pods at La Clementine 

plantation, 12*; Sao Thome, 280; 

Venezuela, 329. 
Cactus, Bolivia, 150; Peru, 150; tree, 

from which wood is obtained, 139*. 
Cajon Negro Pass, 34. 
Caldera, 99. 
Caleta Buena, 113, 122; railway line 

up the face of the steep 3,000-foot 

bluff at, 10*. 
Caliche, beds of the desert, 114-116; 

piles of raw nitrate or, 116*. 
Callao, 104. 

Camel of the plateau, 140. 
Campana, 68. 
"Canal del Mercador," 66. 
Canoe fires, 15. 
Canuma River, 264. 
Cape Horn, 19. 
Caracas, 5, 317, 318, 319, 328, 331; 

Avenida del Sur, principal shopping 

street of, 319*; University and 

Academy of History, 318*; view of, 

317*. 
Caribbean Sea, 294-295. 
Caribe, 333. 
Carnauba, 229-230. 
Cartagena, 311; walls of, built in the 

old Spanish days, 310*. 
Catamarca, 56. 
Cataracts, 264. 
Catatumbo River, 339. 
Cattle, Argentine, 51-52, 55; Brazil, 

199, 209, 227; Colombia, 308; 

Ecuador, 278, 284, 291; Gran Chaco, 

176, 180*, 183; Paraguay, 191; 

Venezuela, 325, 329, 330, 331-332, 

331* 
Cauca River, 300, 305. 



THE INDEX 



XV 



Caura River, 336-338. 

Cayenne, 353, 354; convicts on the 
way to work, 343*. 

Ceara, droughts of, 207-208. 

Cedar trees, 335. 

Cerro de Pasco, 242 ; silver mine that 
enriched the Spanish centuries ago, 
131*. 

Cerro Munchique, 299. 

Cesar River, 301; cattle ranches of the 
valley of the, 308. 

Challapata, llama caravan at, 142*. 

Chapare River, 243*, 248; Bolivian 
Indian shooting fish in, 249*; 
Indians and canoe on, 243*. 

Charcoal burning, 292-293. 

Chile, 3, 5, 9, 11, 27, 30, 32, 34, 73- 
127, 192; animals, 78, 79; Arica, 
famous hill near, 112*; borax, 114, 
115; boundary disputes, 73, 75-76, 
110, 112; "Christ of the Andes," 
monument erected on boundary line 
between Chile and the Argentine, 
after a boundary quarrel between 
Argentine and, 76*; cities, 110-114, 
119-126, see also names of cities; 
climate, 6, 73, 77, 80, 86-87, 90, 
114; coal, 82; coast of northern, 
112-114; copDer, 82, 83; desert, 
84-127, 86*, 87*, 115*; earthquakes, 
122-124; floods, 127; forests, 80, 
81, 86, vegetation map between pp. 
316 and 317*; grazing, 79; hauling 
water from railroad to mines, 98*; 
horses, 73; irrigation, 102*; minerals, 
82; nitrate of soda, 11, 111, 114-122, 
114*. 116*, 120*; people, 73-74; 
products, 101-102; railroads, 113*. 
122; rainfall, 93, 127; salt, 11*; 
scenery, 80-83; size, 74-75; street 
scene in central, 79*; valley of 
central, 73-83; vineyards, 79, 80*. 

Chilecito, province, 56-57; town, 57. 

Chimborazo, 162, 271, 271*. 

Chubut River, 30, 32, 33. 

Church, Colonel, 268. 

Cinchona, 335. 

Cipaquira, 298. 

Ciudad Bolivar (Angostura), 326, 
328, 330, 338. 

Climate, mild belts of South America, 
facing p. 9*; rainfall, mean annual, 
facing p. 8*; rainfall, mean January, 
facing p. 202*; rainfall, mean July, 
facing p. 203*; temperature, mean 
January, facing p. 124*; tempera- 
ture, mean July, facing p. 125*. 

Cliza Valley, 133. 

Coal, Argentine, 50-51; Chile, 82. 

Cochabamba, 133, 136, 155, 175. 

Coffee, Brazil, 10, 199, 212, 217-224, 
227; district, 218*; drying, Sao 
Paulo, 222*; Ecuador, 278; French 
Guiana, 345; loading for U. S. 
market, Santos, 224*; picking, 199*; 
plantation, 210*; plantations, vil- 
lages of the, 222-224; planting, 220; 



preparing for market, 221-222; 
Venezuela, 329; warehouse, Santos, 
223*. 

Colastine, 68. 

Colombia, 209, 276, 279, 294-313. 
340; bananas, 311; boundarv treaty 
between Brazil and, 298; cattle, 308; 
cities, 305, 308-312, 309*. see also 
names of cities; climate, 299-300, 
305, 307, 312; floods, 305; forests, 
308; Indians, 305-308; llanos of 
Casanare, 325*; missionaries, 310; 
mountains, 298-301, 312; native 
village, 307*; paramos, 299-300; 
people, 294-313; physical features, 
296; plains, 298-299; population, 
307; rainfall, 312; revolutions, 312- 
313; rivers, 300, see also names 
of rivers; salt, 297-298; size, 295; 
towns, 308-311; transportation, 298, 
303*; volcanoes, 299, 312; washer- 
women on the Magdalena River, 
near Barranquilla in, 295*; white 
people in, 306-308. 

Concepcion, 191. 

Conquerors or '"Conquistadores," 

"Conquest of Peru," 169. 

Conway, Sir Martin, 157. 

Copiapo, 82, 83; central plaza at, 74*. 

Copper, Argentine, 56; Brazil, 225; 
Chile, 82, 83; Peru, 108. 

Coral, 235. 

Corcovado, 233. 

Cordillera de Choco, 299. 

Cordillera Real, 156-160, 29S. 

Cordoba, 54. 

Corentyn River, 344. 

Corn, 284. 

Coronet, 82. 

Corrientes, 68; general view of, 69*. 

Cotahuasi, 135. 

Cotopaxi, 270-271. 

Cotton, Brazil, 227; of the Gran 
Chaco, 176; Guiana, 345; Peru, 11, 
92, 94; picking, with Chinese labor, 
Uitarte, 5*. 

Courida bush, 343. 

Cowboys, 40*, 181*, 194, 195. 

Cranes, 44. 

Crevaux, 178, 268. 

Crucero Alto, 109. 

Cuenca, 285. 

Cuyaba, 234. 

Cuzco, 110, 149, 154, 163, 164, 169, 
171, 175; ancient capital of the Inca 
Empire, 164*; church on central 
plaza in, 165*; donkey loaded with 
straw for fuel, on street, 170*; 
selling potatoes in thcnr native 
landmarket before Jesuit Church 
and College, 166*; twelve-cornered 
stone in inca palace, 162*; walls of 
old fort, 172*. 

Dawson Island, 17. 
Deer, 334, 346. 



xvi SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Delta plains of the Orinoco, 322- 

324. 
Demarara River, 353. 
Desaguadero River, 144, 145; Uros 

Indian making a reed canoe on the 

border of the great reed swamp of, 

146*. 
Desert, Atacama, 60*, 86*, 109*, 

180*; of Chile, 84-127; Peru, 84-127; 

ports, 91-92, 96-99; rainfall, 127; 

Tarapaca, 87*, 110-112, 124-127, 

126*; travel, 87; vegetation, 84-87, 

map between pp. 316 and 317*; see 

also oases. 
Diamante, 68. 
Diamantina, 225. 

Diamonds, Brazil, 225; Guiana, 344, 
Dog, wild, 346. 
Dutch Guiana, 342, 344, 345; cities, 

353-354; fruit, 344, 345; population, 

343; rice, 344; sugar, 344. 

Earthquakes, 122-124, 270. 

Ecuador, 192, 209, 270-293; animals, 
274, 276, 278; borders, 271-273; 
boundary disputes, 272; cacao, 11, 
12*, 278, 280, 290*, 291; charcoal 
burning, 292-293; cities, 285-293, 
see also names of cities; coffee, 278.; 
climate, 277, 284; corn, 284; earth- 
quakes, 270; floods, 291; hides, 291; 
homes, 291-293; Indians, 273-276, 
285; ivory, 280-283, 291; lowlands 
of the coast, 277-278; meaning of 
word, 270; Panama hats, 291; para- 
mos, 276; people, 273, 281*; plateau, 
283-288; plowing with a crooked 
stick, 289*; population, 273; prod- 
ucts, 291; railroads, 285-288; rain- 
fall, 276, 278, 291; rice, 278, 291; 
size, 271-272; straw {planta de To- 
quilla), 279; only seaport of, 288; 
sugar, 278, 291; sugar cane, harvest- 
ing on a great plantation, 292*; 
tobacco, 278; volcanoes, 270-271, 
285; water power, 286; white people 
of, 273. 

Eels 333 

El Dorado, legend of, 2-4, 267. 

El Gran Chaco, see Gran Chaco. 

El Morro, 112. 

Essequibo River (River of Stones), 
349-350, 351. 

European possessions, 342. 

Explorers, Agassiz, Louis, 268; 
Church, 268; Conway, Sir Martin, 
157; Crevaux, 178, 268; Farrabee, 
269; Germans, 202; Gibbon, 268; 
Herndon, 268; Hojeda, 340; Hum- 
boldt, 253, 268; Ibaretta, 179; 
Keller, 268; Lange, Gunnar, 180; 
Markham, Sir Clements, 268; Pages, 
179; Rondon, 269; Roosevelt, 269; 
Thouar, 179; Vespucius, 229, 340; 
Wallace, 268. 

Famatina Mountains, 57. 



Farming, 159*; Argentine, 38*, 42- 
43*; Bolivia, 135-136; Brazil, 226, 
227; Ecuador, 289*; Inca Empire, 
165; Peru, 4*; Uruguay, 194, 195, 
196. 

Farrabee, 269. 

Feast day for a river, 92. 

Fishermen, a declining tribe of, 143- 
145. 

Flamingo, 44, 332. 

Floods, Amazon, 241; Argentine, 42, 
70; Chile, 127; Colombia, 305; 
Ecuador, 291; Paraguay, 187; Peru, 
92; Venezuela, 326. 

Flora of South America, vegetation 
map between pp. 316 and 317*. 

Forests, of the Amazon Valley, 242- 
245; Argentine, 70; Brazil, 227; 
Chile, 80, 81, 86; Colombia, 308; of 
the Gran Chaco, 176-177; Guiana, 
351-352; Paraguay, 189; Patagonia, 
27; Peru, 86, 106; quebracho, 176; 
rubber, 251-253; of South America, 
vegetation map between pp. 316 
and 317*; Tierra del Fuego, 17; 
tropical, on the banks of a tributary 
of the Amazon, 240*; Venezuela, 
323, 334-336. 

Fox, 276. 

Fray Bentos, 194. 

French Guiana, 342; cacao, 345; 
cities, 353-354; coffee, 345; convicts 
in, on way to work, 343*; fruit, 344; 
penal station, 342; population, 343; 
rice, 344; sugar, 344, 345. 

Frias 129 

Fruit', Argentine, 57; British Guiana, 
344, 345; Dutch Guiana, 344, 345; 
French Guiana, 344; Venezuela, 329. 

Funza (Bogota) River, 311. 

Gallegos, 28. 

GaUegos River, at low tide, 28*. 

Gamelote, 325. 

Gauchos (cowboys), 6, 47, 181*, 194. 

Georgetown, 352-353. 

Germans, 203, 211, 341. 

Gibbon, 268. 

Glaciers, 15. 

Goats, flock of, at Payta, Peru, 95*; 

herds of the Piura Valley, 95. 
Gold, Argentine, 56; Brazil, 225. 
Gorgas, Colonel, 289. 
Goyaz, 71, 211, 234, 269. _ 

Gran Chaco, empty spaces of, 176; 

plains of, 176-184; rivers of, 177. 
Grazing, Argentine, 36, 36*, 41, 46*, 

47*, 52, 60-61, 71; Bolivia, 139-140, 

163; Brazil, 212, 227; Chile, 79; 

Colombia, 308; Patagonia, 29-30, 

31, 32; Peru, 139-140, 163; Uruguay, 

194; Venezuela, 322. 
Guadeloupe, 312. _ , „« 

Guanaco, 16, 22-24, 29, 30, 45, 142- 

143. 
Guaqui, 109, 145. 
Guaviare River, 300. 



THE INDEX 



xvn 



Guayamini, corral at, 36*. 

Guayaquil, 90, 162, 271, 279, 285, 
288-291; firemen, volunteer, ready to 
run with engine, Cathedral Square, 
287*; loading cacao at, typical 
harbor scene, 290*; part of Malecon, 
showing the river front, 288*; street 
in, 286*. 

Guayaquil, Gulf of, 277. 

Guayas River, 277, 288, 291. 

Guianas, 269, 342-354; animals, 346, 
348; cities, 352-354; climate. 342; 
cotton, 345; courida bush, 343; 
diamonds, 344; dikes, 343-345; 
forests, 351-352; fruit, 344; Indians, 
348; mangroves, 343; mountains, 
345-346; negroes, 350-351; rainfall, 
345, 352; rice, 344, 345; river names, 
348-350; rubber, 344; savannas, 
345-346; sugar, 344, 345; swamps 
and dikes, 343-345; wars, 350; 
water falls, 346. 

Guiriri, 333. 

Herndon, 268. 

Heron, 44, 332, 333, 347. 

Hojeda, 340. 

Homes, Argentine, 60; Bolivia, 128, 
136, 153, 160, 250*; Colombia, 
306; Ecuador, 291-293; Indian, 26, 
202, 248; Paraguay, 190, 191; Peru, 
110*; rubber gatherer's, on the 
Upper Amazon, 258*; Venezuela, 
319, 327, 335*, 341. 

Honda Kapids, 302. 

Horses, Argentine, 52; Brazil, 199; 
Chile, 73; Ecuador, 278; Venezuela, 
325, 329. 

Huasco Lake Basin, 148*. 

Huayna Potosi, 157. 

Huaynacotas, in the Cotahuasi Val- 
ley, looking across the terraced 
slopes at, 135*. 

Humboldt, 253, 268, 323; dream of 
great cities on the Amazon, 253- 
254. 

Hurricanes, 207. 

Ibaretta, 179. 
Ibicuy River, 66. 

Ibis, 44, 332, 347. 
Iguassu Falls, 189. 
Iguassu River, 65, 189. 
Illimani, 157. 

Inca Empire, boundaries, 172-173; 
civilization, 161-163; crops, 166-167; 
Cuzco, ancient capital of, 163, 164*, 
170-171; forts, 171*, 172*; irrigation 
in, 164; people of, 161; road building 
in, 171; Spaniards take possession 
of, 175; taxes, 166-167. 

Inca kings, 163-165; agents, 165; 
and people, 161-175; palaces and 
temples, 162*, 169-172. 

Inca religion, 167-169, 173-174. 

Indians, 29, 128, 131, 143, 188, 190, 
197; of Amazon Basin, 245-253; and 



canoe on Rio Chapare, 243*; of the 
Andean plateau harvesting potatoes, 
159*; Araucanians, 173; Bakairi, 
202; blanket weaving among the 
plateau, 145*; Bolivia, 243*; Brazil, 
202, 215; Carajas, 202; Caribs 
(Caraios), 323; Colombia, 305-308; 
Ecuador, 273-276, 285; of El Gran 
Chaco, 176-184; Guiana, 348; Inca 
Empire, 161-175; Mura, 247-248- 
Onas, 16-18; pampa, 47-48; Quitos, 
173; shooting fish with bow and 
arrow from canoe on the Rio Chapare, 
249*; as Slaves, 251-253, 254, 256; 
Tehuelches, 21-27; Tobas, 179, 183- 
184; one of the Uros making a ^anoe, 
146*; Venezuela, 322, 338; Warraus, 
322; Yaghans, 14-16; Yuracare, 248- 
2ol, poling canoe upstream in the 
Amazon Basin, 242*; Yurunas, 202; 
Zaparo, 274. 

Iodine, 117. 

Iquique, 113, 119-121, 124; fleet of 
ships from many countries at the 
port of, loading nitrate of soda, 
120*; harbor of, 117*. 

Iquitos, 260, 261, 262; at head of 
steamer navigation on the Amazon, 
262*. 

Iron, Argentine. 56; Brazil, 225, 226. 

Irrigation, Bolivia, 133-134, 136; 
Brazil, 208; Chile, 102*; among the 
Incas, 164; Peru, 4*, 99*, 99-101, 
100*, 101*, 136. 

Ivory, Ecuador, 280-283, 291. 

Jaguar, 274, 334. 

Javary River, village on, 254*. 

Juliaca, 110. 

Junin de los Andes, 32, 34. 

Juntas Valley, 136, 246. 

Kaieteur Falls, 346. 
Keller, 268. 

La Guaira, 5, 316, 317, 318. 

Laguna de Guatayoc, 60. 

Laguna del Portezuelo, 59. 

Lake Nahuel Huapi, 30, 31*. 32; 
district of, 34. 

La Mesa, 310. 

Lange, Gunnar, 180. 

La Paz, 108, 145, 146, 149, 152- 
156, 175; market scene in, 154*; 
moving dav in, 143*; view of, 156*. 

La Plata estuary, 3, 63, 64, 197. 

La Plata River, 42, 47, 65, 196. 

La Rioja, 56. 

Latacunga, 285. 

Lauricocha, Lake, 242. 

Ledesma, sugar works, 178*. 

Lelejo, 30. 

Lima, 105-108, 175; fertile irrigated 
garden farms near, 4*; general view- 
near, 106*. 

Lion, mountain, 276. 



xvm SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Llamas, Argentine, 60, 61; Bolivia, 
134, 139, 140; caravan of, at 
Challapata, 142*; Peru, 139, 140. 

Llaneros, 325. 

Llanos, of Venezuela, 314-341; animal 
life of the, 332-334; cattle driving in 
the northern, 331-332; seaport in 
the, 328-330. 

Los Repollos, 31. 

Lota, 82. 

Madeira River, 239, 240, 259; 
cataracts of, 264; falls of the, 259*, 
265*. 

Madeira-Mamore Railroad, 260*. 

Magdalena delta, 311. 

Magdalena River, 300, 301-305, 308, 
311; canoe loaded with bananas on 
the, 337*; group of native washer- 
women, near Barranquilla on the, 
295*; La Gloria on the, 306*; river 
steamer on, 304*; scene on the lower, 
301*; wood station on, 305*. 

Magellan, Strait of, 18, 19, 27, 80, 
81. 

Mahogany, Brazil, 228; Venezuela, 
335. 

Ma more River, 183. 

Manaos, 234, 254-255, 258, 260; 
general view of the port of, 255*; 
market of, 256*. 

Manatee, 333. 

Mangroves, Guiana, 343; Venezuela, 
323. 

Manioc, 190, 266. 

Maracaibo, 341. 

Maracaibo, Lake, 339, 340. 

Maripa, 337. 

Markham, Sir Clements, 268. 

Ma tar i 247 

Matilla', oasis of, 121, 124, 126, 126*. 

Matto Grosso, 70,. 71, 211, 216, 269. 

Mendoza, 54. 

Minas Geraes, 224, 225, 226, 227. 

Minerals, Argentine, 56-58; Bolivia, 
110, 128, 130, 134; Brazil, 199, 
224-227; Chile, 82-83; Peru, 107, 
108, 110, 131*. 

Mollendo, 87, 108, 110, 111. 

Mompos, 305. 

Money, Bolivian ten-cent piece, 141*. 

Monkeys, 274, 334. 

Montevideo, 195, 196-197. 

Mountains, Andes, 3, 6, 29-30, 37, 
38, 55, 75, 85, 88*, 137*, 147*, 148*. 
239, 246*. 297, 298, 300, 308; of 
the Brazil coast, 204-205; Cerro 
Munchique, 299; Chimborazo, 162, 
271, 271*; Corcovado, 233; Cordil- 
lera de Choco, 299; Cordilleras, 
156-160, 298; Cotopaxi, 270-271; 
Famatina, 57; Guadeloupe, 312; 
Huayna Potosi, 157; Illimani, 157; 
Moncerrate, 312; Pao de Assucar 
(Sugar-loaf), 233; Pichincha, 285; 
Roraima, 346; San Ruiz, 312; Serra 
Pacaraima, 338; Serra Parima, 338; 



Sierra Nevada de Merida, 320; 

Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, 299, 

308; Sorata, 157; Tolima, 312. 
Mules, Brazil, 199, 227; Venezuela, 

329 
Mura Indians, 247-248. 

Nahuel Huapi, Lake, 30, 31*, 32; 

district, 34. 
Napo Valley, wild tribes of the, 274- 

275. 
Negro River, 27, 30, 34, 37, 239, 252, 

254. 
Negroes of the hot lowlands, 

305-306; see also Black Race. 
Neiva River, 302. 
Neuquen, 30. 
Nevados de Araca, 130. 
Nickel, Argentine, 56. 
Nickerie, 344. 
Nitrate of soda, 11, 111, 114-122; 

ready for transportation, 116*; ships 

from many countries at port of 

Iquique, loading, 120*. 
Nitrate ports, 119-122; fields and, 

114*. 
Novita, 306. 
Nutrias, 330. 

Oases, Matilla, 121, 124, 126, 126*; 

Soncor, 115*; Tarapaca, 124-127. 
Oran, 178. 

Oranges, Paraguay, 185-186. 
Orinoco, basin, 296; delta, 321*. 

322-327, 339; lowlands, 6. 
Orinoco River, 297, 320, 321, 322- 

324, 326-327, 328, 330, 333, 339, 

343. 
Oruro, 155. 

Ostrich hunting, 22-24. 
Otter, 333. 

Pages, 179. 

Paguei River, crossing the, 329*. 

Paillara, 333. 

Palms, 213, 334. 

Pampas, 37-48; animals, 45-46; birds 
and insects, 44-45; farming, 42; 
gauchos, 46-47; grasses, 41; Indians, 
47-48; mirage and cloud scenery, 
39-41; plowing, 38*; prairie dog, 
43-44; railroad, 52*; rainfall, 42, 
vegetation map of South America, 
between pp. 316 and 317*; winds, 
41-42. 

Panama Canal, 103. 

Panama hat, 279, 291. 

Pao de Assucar (Sugar-loaf), 233, 
233* 

Para (Belem), 10, 258, 265-267; boat 
landing, 261*; municipal theater, 
266*. 

Paraguay, 9, 185-191, 192, 215, 216 
cattle, 191; cities, 188*, 191, set 
also names of cities; climate, 187-188 
floods, 187; forests, 189; Gran Chaco 
176-184; homes, 190, 191; oranges 



THE INDEX 



xix 



185-186; people, 190-191; physical 
features, 187-188; population, 187; 
tea, 185; woman of, smoking, 190*. 

Paraguay River, 37, 70, 177, 188- 
189. 

Paramaribo, 353, 354; view of, the 
capital of Dutch Guiana, 353*. 

Paramos, 276, 299-300; of Andes, 
vegetation map, between pp. 316 and 
317*. 

Parana, city, 68, bird's-eye view of, 
68*; state, 216. 

Parana River, 37, 64, 65, 70, 189; 
dredging a channel, 67*; falls of, 
189; grasslands of the valley of the, 
70-72; scene on, 65*. 

Patagonia, 11, 21-34, 48, 56; animals, 
28, 29; climate, 33; forests, 27; 
grazing, 30, 31, 32; meaning of 
word, 21; "No Man's Land," 21; 
railways, 34; rainfall, 28; shingle 
plain, 28-29; surface, 27-28; Welsh 
settlers, 31-34; western, 30-31. 

Patia River, 300. 

Payta, 84, 91-92, 93, 279; British 
steamer with Chinese rice at, 91*; 
flock of goats and shepherds at, 95*; 
stream channel used as a street in, 
94*. 

Peccary, 334, 346. 

People, see Races of Man. 

Pernambuco (Recife), harbor of , 236; 
inner harbor of, 208*; ox cart in, 
206*; shipping at port of, 207*. 

Peru, 3, 5, 9, 11, 192, 209, 225, 263, 
279; animals, 95, 95*, 134, 139, 
140-143; barley, 155; borax, 111; 
boundary disputes, 73, 110-112; 
cactus, 150; central coast region, 
100; cities, 91-93, 96-99, 104-110, 
see also names of cities; climate, 
86-87, 90, 163; coastal desert, 84- 
127; cotton, 5*, 11, 92, 94; earth- 
quake, 122-124; farming, 135-136; 
fishing, 143-145; floods, 92; forests, 
86, 106; fuel, 149-152; grazing, 
139-140, 163; highland dwellers, 
128-160; home in western, 110*; 
hunting, 142; Incas, 161-175; irriga- 
tion, 4*, 99*, 99-101, 100*, 101*. 
136; Mecca of, 105; minerals, 107, 
108, 110, 131*; Nile of Northern, 92; 
northern coast region, 99*; potatoes, 
155, 166*; products, 101-102, 155; 
railways, 107-110; rainfall, 93-94, 
127; rice, 92, 103; southern coast 
region, 101*; sugar, 11, 92, 95; 
terraced alluvial fans of the plateau 
of, 134-136; trade of the coast valleys 
of, 101-103; wool, 142, 144*, 155. 

Pica, 121, 125. 

Pichincha, 285. 

Pilcomayo River, 177, 178-181. 

Pisagua, 113, 119, 122. 

Piura, 92; rainfall, 93; rice, 103. 

Piura River, 92; goat herds of the 
valley of the, 95. 



Plantations, coffee, 210*. 220-221; 

sugar, 344, 345*. 
Poopo, Lake, 145. 
Population of South America, 

density of, facing p. 316*, see also 

Races of Man. 
Port Desire, 28. 
Port San Julian, 28. 
Porto Madryn, 34. 
Porto Velho, 240, 259, 260*. 
Portuguese, 6, 192, 203, 211, 353 
Potaro River, 346. 
Potatoes, 159*; Bolivia, 155; Peru, 

155, 166*; Venezuela, 337. 
Potosi, 129, 132*. 
Puma, 274, 334. 
Puna de Atacama, 59. 
Puno, 109, 110, 145; port of, 147*. 
Punta Arenas, 19-20; part of the 

town of, 18*; position of, in regard 

to ocean trade routes, 19. 

Quebracho, 176, 182*. 

Quito, 162, 285; city of the equator, 
283*; old Spanish church, La 
Compania, in, 272*; street in, 284*. 

Races of man, South America, facing 
p.«317*. 

Railroads, Argentine, 52*, 53-56 
Bolivia, 85*; Brazil, 201*, 217, 218 
Chile, 10*, 113*. 122; Patagonia, 34 
Peru, 107-110; of South America 
political map between pp. 8 and 9* 
of Southern South America, facing 
p. 35*; Venezuela, 317-318. 

Rainfall of South America, mean 
annual, facing p. 8*; mean January, 
facing p. 202*; mean July, facing p. 
203*. 

Ranch life in Venezuela, 330. 

Rawson, 34. 

Recife, see Pernambuco. 

Religion, Brazil Indians, 203; Catholic 
175; Chile, 125-126; Incas, 167-169, 
173-174; Indian, 125; Peru, 125- 
126. 

Reptiles, 334. 

Rhea, see ostrich. 

Riberalta, 260, 264. 

Rice, in Brazil, 212, 214-215; British 
Guiana, 344; Dutch Guiana, 344; 
Ecuador, 278, 291; French Guiana, 
344; Gran Chaco, 176; Guiana, 344, 
345; Peru, 92, 103; Venezuela, 337, 
338 

Rimac Valley, 107. 

Rio Ariguani, 308. 

Riobamba, 285; up-country hospital- 
ity among the natives in, 281*. 

Rio Chapare, see Chapare River. 

Rio Chubut, see Chubut River. 

Rio de Janeiro, 206, 210, 219, 226, 
230-235; Avenida Central, a street 
in, 232*; Botafogo, 231*. 233; city 
and harbor, view of, 233*; harbor. 



XX SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



234-235; Monroe Palace, 234*; 
population, 234. 

Rio de la Plata, see La Plata River. 

Rio Gallegos, see Gallegos River. 

Rio Grande, 183. 

Rio Negro, see Negro River. 

Rio Ttaeodoro, 269. 

"River of Doubt," 269. 

Rivers, Amazon, 3, 6, 84, 206, 237- 
242, 238*, 241*, 242*, 264, 268- 
269, 297; Apure, 328, 328*, 329, 
330, 331; Atrato, 300; Babahoyo, 
277*; Bermejo, 177, 178; Bogota, 
311; Bravo, 65; Canuma, 264; 
Catatumbo, 339; Cauca, 300, 305; 
Caura, 336-338; Cesar, 301, 308; 
Chapare, 248, 249*; Chubut, 30, 32, 
33; Corentyn, 344; Demarara 353; 
Desaguadero, 144, 145, 146*; Esse- 
quibo (River of Stones), 349-350, 
351; Funza, 311; Gallegos, 28*; of 
the Gran Chaco, 177; Guaviare, 300; 
Guayas, 277, 288, 291; Ibicuy, 66; 
Iguassu, 65, 189; Javary, 254*; La 
Plata, 42, 47, 65, 196; Madeira, 239, 
240, 259, 259*; Magdalena, 295*, 
300, 301-305, 304*. 305*. 306*. 
308, 311, 337*; Mamore, 183; 
Negro, 27, 30, 34, 37, 239,-254; 
Neiva, 302; Orinoco, 297, 320, 321, 
322-324, 326-327, 328, 330, 333, 
339, 343; Paguei, 329*; Paraguay, 
37, 70, 177, 188-189; Parana, 37, 
64, 65*, 67*. 70, 189; Patia, 300; 
Pilcomayo, 177, 178-181; Potaro, 
346; Piura, 92; Rio Ariguani, 308; 
Rio Grande, 183; Salado, 37; San 
Juan, 306; Surinam, 354; Tapajos, 
203, 241*, 264; Theodoro, 269; 
Tocantins, 202, 264; Tortuga, 333; 
Xingu, 202-203, 264- Yapacani, 
183; Zulia, 339. 

Roca, General, 48. 

Rondon, Colonel, 269. 

Roosevelt, 269. 

Roraima, 346. 

Rosario, 66-68. 

Royal Cordillera, see Cordillera Real. 

Rubber, 257*, 258*; in Amazonia, 
251-253, 255-269; Bolivia, 183, 
200; Brazil, 199; commerce, 259- 
269; Ecuador, 272; Guiana, 344; 
Venezuela, 335. 

Sacsahuaman, Fort, 170, 171*. 

Salado River, 37. 

Salaverry, port of, 96*. 

Salt, Amazon Valley, 264; Argen- 
tine, 37, 59; Bolivia, 138*, 146-148, 
148*, 264; Brazil, 230; Chile, 11*; 
Colombia, 297-298. 

San Antonio, 258, 260. 

San Fernando, 331. 

San Juan River, 306. 

San Martin de los Andes, 32, 34. 

San Nicolas, 68. 

San Pedro, 68. 



San Ruiz, 312. 

Santa Cruz de la Sierra, 181-183. 

Santa Fe, 68; view of an irrigated 
garden in the Loa Valley, 102*. 

Santa Marta, 311. 

Santa Rosa, 264; one of the eastern 
towns at the headwaters of a plains 
stream, 252*. 

Santarem, 241. 

Santos, 10, 219; central market of, 
219*; coffee, loading for the U. S. 
market at, 224*; coffee warehouse at, 
223*. 

Sao Francisco Valley, 207. 

Sao Paulo, 215, 219, 220; drying 
coffee in, 222*. 

Sao Roque, Cape, 205, 207, 208. 

Sao Salvador, see Bahia. 

Sao Thome, 280. 

Sarsaparilla, 335. 

Savanilla, 311. 

Savannas of South America, vege- 
tation map between pp. 316 and 
317*. 

Serra Pacaraima, 338. 

Serra Parima, 338. 

Sheep, Argentine, 46, 52, 60*; 
Bolivia, 134, 139; Brazil, 227; 
Patagonia, 28; Peru, 134, 139. 

Shepherd, highland, 139-140. 

Sierra Nevada de Merida, 320. 

Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, 299, 
308. 

Silver, Argentine, 56; Bolivia, 134; 
Brazil, 225; Peru, 108, 131*. 

Slaves, Indian, 251-253, 254, 256; 
negro, 223. 

Soda, see Nitrate of Soda. 

Soledad, 328. 

Soncor, oasis of, 115*. 

Sorata, 157. 

South America, 123; cities, political 
map, between pp. 8 and 9*, see also 
names of cities; climate, mild belts, 
facing p. 9*; deserts, vegetation map 
between pp. 316 and 317*; exports, 
261, 278; flora, vegetation map 
between pp. 316 and 317*; forests, 
vegetation map between pp. 316 and 
317*; harbors and products, 9-13; 
hunting ground of, 314-316; mild 
belts, facing p. 9*; missionaries, 3; 
pampas, vegetation map between pp. 
316 and 317*; people of, and the 
land they conquered, 1-13; political 
map, between pp. 8 and 9*; popula- 
tion, 192-193; population, density of, 
facing p. 316*; races of man, facing 
p. 317*; railroads, political map 
between pp. 8 and 9*; rainfall, mean 
annual, facing p. 8*; rainfall, mean 
January, facing p. 202*; rainfall, 
mean July, facing p. 203*; relief map, 
between pp. 202 and 203*; savanna, 
vegetation map between pp. 316 and 
317*; soil, 4; Southern, facing p. 35*; 
temperature, mean January, facing 



THE IXDEX 



XXI 



p. 124*; temperature, mean July, 
facing p. 125*; vegetation map 
between pp. 316 and 317*; wars of 
emancipation, 4-6. 

Southern South America, facing p. 
35*. 

Southernmost city in the world, 18. 

Spaniards, 4-5, 6, 7, 8, 47, 64, 76, 
104, 161, 175, 192, 203, 310, 340, 
341, 353. 

Spoonbill, 44, 332. 

Squatters, see Argentine. 

Steamship routes, 102-103, political 
map between pp. 8 and 9*. 

Straw (planta de Toquilla), 279. 

Straw boat on the ocean, 103. 

Sucre, 141. 

Sugar, Argentine, 10; Brazil, 212, 
213, 227, 229; British Guiana, 344, 
345*, 353; Dutch Guiana, 344; 
Ecuador, 278, 291, 292*; French 
Guiana, 344, 345; Guiana, 344, 
345; Peru, 11, 92, 95; Venezuela, 
318, 329, 337; works at Ledesma, 
178*. 

Sugar-loaf, see Pao de Assucar. 

Sun worship, 167-169. 

Surinam River, 354. 

Tacaloa, 305. 

Tacna, province, 110, 111; town, 110. 

Taltal, 98, 112, 113; hauling water at, 

97*. 
Tapajos River, 203, 241*. 264. 
Tapir, 276, 334, 346; and young, 347*. 
Tarapaca, 111. 
Tarapaca Desert, caravan starting 

on a journey across, 87*; oases, 124- 

127; prosperous oasis of Matilla in, 

126*. 
Tea, Brazil, 215-217; Paraguay, 185. 
Tehuelches, 21-27, 23*. 25*, 26*. 
Temblador, 337. 
Temperature of South America, 

mean January, facing p. 124*; mean 

July, facing p. 125*. 
Tenerife, 305. 

Tequendama, Falls of, 311. 
Thouar, 179. 
Tierra del Fuego, 16-18; climate, 17; 

forests, 17. 
Titicaca, Lake, 84, 144, 147*; 

steamers of, 145-146. 
Tobacco, 10, 227, 266, 278. 
Tocantins River, 202, 264. 
Tocantins, village of, 267. 
Tocopilla, 113, 122. 
"Toldo" or tent, home of aTehu?lche 

family, 26*. 
Tolima, 312. 
Tonka beans, 337. 
Tortuga River, 333. 
Transportation, on the Amazon, 258, 

261, 262; in the Argentine, 58-59; 

bullock wagons, 53-54; llama, 140- 

141, 142*; mule carts, 179*; pack 



train, 58*. 303*; water, 303, 304*; 

see also railroads. 
Trelew, 34. 
Trinidad, 260, 264. 
Tucotuco, 30. 
Tucuman, 54. 
Turtles, 266-267, 268*. 274, 333. 

Uitarte, picking cotton with Chinese 
labor on irrigated land at foot of 
Andes, 5*. 

Uruguay, 71, 192-198, 215, 216; 
area, 193; cities, 194-197; climate, 
193; farming, 194, 195, 196; grazing, 
194; products, 194; size, 193; wars, 
197-198; wool, 194. 

Valencia, 5, 331. 

Valley of the 16th of October, 31- 

34. 

Valparaiso, 77, 84, 124; meaning of 
word, 77; monument to Prat y 
Bahia in, 78*. 

Vegetation map of South America, 
between pp. 316 and 317*. 

Venezuela, 3, 5, 294, 314-341; 
animals, 325, 329, 330, 331, 332- 
334; bananas, 337; cacao, 329; 
cattle on their way to market, 
llanos of, 331*; cedar, 335; cinchona, 
335; cities, 316-319, 328, see also 
names of cities; coastal features, 339; 
coffee, 329; delta plains of the 
Orinoco in, 322-324; floods, 326; 
forests, 334-336; fruit, 329; govern- 
ment, 314-316; grasslands, 324-325; 
grazing, 322; harbors, 339; homes, 
327, 335*, 341; hunting ground of 
South America, 314-316; Indians, 
322, 338; "little Venice" of, 339- 
341; llanos, 314-341, 324-325, 329, 

330, 331-334; mahogany, 335; 
mangroves, 323, 339; marshes, 322; 
mountains, 314-341; outline of, 
319-320; palms, 334; people, 336- 
339; plains, 320-325; potatoes, 337; 
prairie fires of the grasslands, 330- 
331; railroads, 317-318; rainfall, 

331, 332, 340; ranch life, 330, 335*; 
rice, 337, 338; rivers, 326-327, 327*. 
329, 336-338; rubber, 335; sarsa- 
parilla, 335; scenery, 316-319, 324- 
325; sugar, 318, 329, 337; tonka 
beans, 337; towns, 316-319; wars, 
315; western, on the road to Barinas, 
320*. 

Venezuela, Gulf of, 340 

Vespucius, Americus, 229, 340. 

Vicuna, 45, 142, 143. 

Villa Argentina, 56. 

Villa Bella, 264 

Villa Constitucion, 68. 

Villa del Pilar, 191. 

Villa Rica, 191. 

Vineyards, 79, 80*. 

Vizcacha, 29, 43-44, 148. 

Volcanoes, 270, 285, 299, 312. 



xxii SOUTH AMERICA: A GEOGRAPHY READER 



Wallace, 268. 

Wars, Chile and Peru, 73, 110, 112; 

Colombia, 3 1 2-3 1 3 ; of Emancipation, 

4-6; Guiana, 350; Inca, 172-173; 

Uruguay, 197-198; Venezuela, 315. 
Wax, 230. 
Welsh, 31-34. 
Wheat, 48; croppers at work in one of 

fhe great fields of the Argentine 

Republic, 50*. 
White race, Races of Man, facing 

p. 317*. 
Whymper, 270. 
Wine, Brazil, 229; Chile, 79, 80. 



Wool, 11, 33; Bolivia, 142, 155; Peru, 
142, 144*, 155; Uruguay, 194. 

Xingu River, 264. 
Xingu Valley, 202-203. 

Yaghans, 14-16. 

Yankees of South America, 73-74. 
Yapacani River, 183. 
Yellow race, Races of Man, facing 
p. 317*. 

Zarate, 68. 
Zipaquira, 310. 
Zulia River, 339. 



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the "driftless" area of Wisconsin and the adjacent states. 
Hand mounted. Size 46 x 66 inches. 

Van Cleef's Rainfall Map of the United States 

By Eugene C. Van Cleef, Professor of Geography, Normal 
School, Diiluth, Minnesota 

A complete, accurate, and scientific wall map of the normal 
annual precipitation based upon the most recent bulletins 
of the United States Weather Bureau. Topographic influ- 
ences are well pictured. The variety of the mountain regions, 
and simplicity on the plains are shown with an accuracy and 
detail not seen in the ordinary rainfall map. 

"We have long needed such a map," writes Robert DeC. 
Ward, Professor of Climatology in Harvard University. 
Hand mounted. Size 46 x 66 inches. 

The True Literary Map of the British Isles 

By Blanche L. True, Department of English, Fargo College, 
Fargo, North Dakoia 

A map of great interest to teachers and students of liter- 
ature and history. It brings out with surprising realism the 
romantic and historic atmosphere of the Isles, localizing for 
the reader the wonderful places and characters that seemed 
in the past like visions and dreams. Birthplaces and haunts 
of authors are given, and places famed in history. 

Printed in colors. Hand mounted. Size 46 x 66 inches. 

Write for descriptive matter 

RAND McNALLY & COMPANY 

CHICAGO NEW YORK 



HAY -0 1943 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

WHHNL 

015 807 348 1 




